Who is Crayak to the Yeerks?

[NateSean]

Right, yeah... you got it. I've never even heard of a Go board,

Neither did American troops, which is why we got the crap kicked out of us in Vietnam. Observe the viewing globe: 10 Minute Go E01

Moving on.

The minor point I brought up was that it wasn't just Visser Three who recognized Crayak. Jake sees it as Temrash is dying at the end of The Capture. And since Jake was able to see Temrash's memories in his final moments.

Do we take that as Crayak sizing up Jake, because he knows the Ellimist is about to make a move on Rachel in the next book? Or, is it just as plausible that the Yeerks see Crayak right before their death? That perhaps he is the closes thing they have to a deity. Remember, the Andalites have no concept of Crayak.

They think the Ellimist is one of a race of beings called the Ellimists. Until Elfangor stumbled across it, The Time Matrix existed only in their mythology as an invention of these higher beings. Heck, only Rachel knows that Ellimist is the user name of Toomin. Unless Ellimist also told Elfangor in the moments after his death, but even still, the current races who know of Ellimist are all in the dark about him.

Yeerks don't balance out Andalites.

Lets examine that a little more closely.

Andalites. Once helpless pray animals who fell victim to giant predators. They spoke through sign langauge, had no tail blades, and no concept of rudimentary weapons with which to defend themselves.

The Ellimist tweaks their genetic make up and now the Andalites are technologically superior race, with tail blades, advanced culture and a thirst to explore the universe. There's good and bad among the Andalites, but for the most part they are largely benevolent if not arrogant.

Yeerks. Helpless slugs that were pray to a creater called the Vanarx and probably a dozen or so other predators that existed on their homeworld. Lets face it, the Yeerks were not apex predators. Like the Andalites, they were very much at the bottom of their food chain.

So, Crayak enters the game with an omniscience upgrade and sees that Ellimist has all ready had a hand in messing with the universe,.Crayak sees what he did with Andalites and notices these slugs. He thinks, "lets up the stakes," and gives the Yeerks the ability to infest other creatures, namely the Gedds.

The Yeerks form a governing body like the Andalites, and display such an advanced understanding of their own world that it draws the attention of Seerow. Five years later, the Yeerks are suddenly an equally formidable species that actually pose a threat to the Andalites and all life in the galaxy.
There's good and bad among them as well.

Thus they are a balance to the Andalites, who would otherwise be the most powerful race in the galaxy.

[DinosaurNothlit]

This is a very interesting topic, and both sides have brought up very good points here.  But I think everyone seems to be omitting one important detail.  Why does Crayak do any of the things he does in the first place?

Two reasons are generally given for Crayak's behavior (other than the general consensus that he's just insane).  One: he feeds on fear.  Two: he wants one 'master race' to serve him.

Under the first reason, one could assume that he would choose the Yeerks as his champions, because what better way to spread fear could there be than an army of brain-stealing slugs who steal your free will?  Heck, that works even better than massacres, because dead people don't feel fear, whereas controllers do.

And under the second reason, it also makes sense for Crayak to have use for the Yeerks, albeit not in as direct a sense.  The reason he wants all the galaxy's races to wipe each other out, is because he's searching for the perfect race which will then turn around and serve him, right?  But of course, any race that is badass enough to win a victory over the entire rest of the galaxy probably isn't going to serve any higher power of their own free will, and according to the rules of the game, Crayak can't really compel them to do anything they don't want to do.  Enter the Yeerks.  The Yeerks tend to be more subservient than most other races, at least whenever subservience happens to be in their best interest.  They tend not to fight unwinnable battles, in any case.  So, pop a few Yeerks into the heads of whatever Crayak's 'chosen' race turns out to be, and you have an ideal race in Crayak's eyes.  Perfect killing machines that are also humble servants that he can bend to his will.

[RYTX]

Toomin about his role on the Andalite planet in TEC
"They had no art, no science, no agriculture. But they had already evolved from pure grazers, herd members, into distinct individuals. They had potential. I lived with them, and refused to teach, refused to interfere. On one other occasion I employed my weapon to fend off a monster's attack. But that was all."

The Ellimist on Crayak's M.O. book 26
His goal, I soon realized, is to destroy life. His method is to use one species against another,
strong destroying weak, and then strong in turn being destroyed by the stronger still. He believes that there should be only one species. A single sentient race, which would be subjugated by him."

These things in mind I make the following arguments:

The Ellimist did not impact Andalite evolution. He lived amongst them for a while, as one of them, and took his leave without any radical altercations of their world. The creature that lived among they is hardly the same as the creature of Andalite folk lore-which didn't exist at the time. The Andalites were not "his", to do his work-that was the Pemalites.
So, if the Yeerks are a balance to the Andalites, it is not because Ellimist and Crayak set them up to oppose the other, that early on.

While I agree, Crayak sought to kill, not enslave, that's not to say he couldn't take advantage of the situation the Yeerks present. They are set loose on the galaxy, and even if their end goal is not to kill, things will die in route-they are the source of a galactic war. Furthermore, it still suits his aims in that if the Yeerks become the ruling race over all others, he only needs to, in effect, stamp them out, and can nail the Empire and all it's slave races at once.

All that being said: my thought is that V3, a while traveled Yeerk as he is, picks up a number of stories. He didn't believe in Crayak, says so himself-so no matter where he got the name, he rejects it as a story at first anyway. Maybe it is Yeerk lore.
Maybe he picked up off a bunch of Skrit Na traders over the years.

But to the Yeerks at large, Crayak is probably no more than a story-if that.
 
The game they play is much more subtle than live/die, explode/protect, Yeerk/Andalite. It comes down to, as
Tobias once said-side bets.
They have the whole galaxy to play with. And yes sometimes they toy with each others pawns: seems like everyone had some investment in Rachel.
How they and their legends get around is anyone's guess, but it's a safe bet more than a couple things have heard of them throughout the eons. Doesn't mean they've altered the destiny of every species. And certainly doesn't mean they've left any alone
 

[Darth Revan]

Very nicely put.

[esplin]

I'm glad to see a couple people that don't believe Crayak is the champion of the yeerks.  It fits nicely but that is about it.  I don't remember any concrete evidence in the books about this topic but I will admit I'm not the most studied on the series.

I think RYTX got it right when he said that they have the whole galaxy to play with.

[Snakie]

I'm glad to see a couple people that don't believe Crayak is the champion of the yeerks.  It fits nicely but that is about it.  I don't remember any concrete evidence in the books about this topic but I will admit I'm not the most studied on the series.

I think RYTX got it right when he said that they have the whole galaxy to play with.

I guess I got the impression in book 27 that Crayak didn't want the Iskroots to survive because the Yeerks might one day see an alternative to their conquering rampage throughout the galaxy.

It also seems like the Ellimist chose the Animorphs for his end game and considered them important because of their war against the Yeerks, meaning its likely that the other side (Crayak) had an interest in the Yeerks.   I guess thats more an argument for why it fits though.

[NateSean]

I'm glad to see a couple people that don't believe Crayak is the champion of the yeerks. 

I didn't say he was their champion, I only suggested that he had a hand in their evolution and culture.

[Darth Revan]

Yeah, the Yeerks definitely help his cause, but they are not likely his main pieces in their little game.

[Shenmue654]

Games between Immortals rely on a conceit that we as human beings don't really understand: the idea that Time is exactly how the Doctor described it. A great big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey...stuff. That is, to them it's completely possible to see the outcome of things that happen in the "past"....and to find various ways of altering these outcomes. This could be happening all the time, millions of times between the Ellimist and Crayak in the Animorphs universe.

Odds are that the game being played by the Ellimist and the Crayak somehow involves the Yeerk-Andalite war, and especially if the Yeerks get the humans or not. (After all, why else would the Ellimist care so much about the Animorphs so as to have seen him nearly four or five times?) This probably means that at different times they have both affected race evolution of the Yeerks and Andalites. I can see the Ellimist altering Andalite biology in order to create an opponent for the Yeerks in the future. Or vice versa with the Yeerks themselves. There's hints in the books that the two are more involved than good old obfuscating Toomin would ever admit, but there's really no clear statement that points to who did what.

Jake seeing Crayak when Temrash dies is interesting because the phrasing suggests that this is when Crayak first notices Jake. I.E. "It saw me." That would mean that, like some people here have said, Crayak has interfered more with the Yeerks than the Ellimist has and that Jake saw him as a consequence of Temrash dying. So in short....it's vague. But what with Immortals isn't vague? ^^;;;;

[Darth Revan]

Games between Immortals rely on a conceit that we as human beings don't really understand: the idea that Time is exactly how the Doctor described it. A great big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey...stuff. That is, to them it's completely possible to see the outcome of things that happen in the "past"....and to find various ways of altering these outcomes. This could be happening all the time, millions of times between the Ellimist and Crayak in the Animorphs universe.

Yeah, that makes sense. Especially in the third Megamorphs, where The Drode mentions that he prepared the Animorphs for this very challenge before they even became Animorphs. He even hinted that he was responsible for those kids being "related" (i.e. friends, acquaintences) to each other.

But what with Immortals isn't vague? ^^;;;;

Too true.

[Gafrash]

I don't know about all these Cryak's-investment-in-the-Yeerks-as-a-whole hypothesis... It didn't feel like he cared about Visser Three when he manipulated Rachel to go all unbeatable psycho on him. V3's life was nothing to Cryak.

Yeah, the Yeerks definitely help his cause, but they are not likely his main pieces in their little game.

I think this is more acurate, to what I am trying to say.

RYTX put it nicely. Cryak's interest lies in the death of everything, culling all life, towards one that would serve him throughout the universe.
It could be as simple as the Yeerks are just ONE species. Whose primary objective is not in tune with Cryak's. He could well use them, granted, but they are not his ultimate goal.

And the way Temrash died could have just flagshipped Jake as a new piece in Cryak's move against the Ellimist. I never took it as Cryak being associated with every Yeerk death. But it does mean that there was some interest, on Cryak's part, in toying/hinting at Jake in this 'game' of theirs. Why else would Jake have gotten the one Yeerk, the one Yeerk that had been in his older brother's head previously, out of all the others in line?!?
That scene was just a 'Big Brother is watching you' message to Jake.

[Darth Revan]

Yeah, I saw it more like Jake was a thorn in Crayak's side, and Crayak wanted Jake to know he was watching him. That's part of the reason The Drode kept wanting Rachel to kill him. They'd get a blood thirsty tool, and Jake would be dead.

Though the Yeerks may not be his main pieces in this death vs life game the two are playing, like Risk, every piece counts.

I think the Ellimist puts more attention and care into the Yeerk/Andalite war than Crayak does.