Alien Nine: Emulators

Studio - CPM Manga
Age - Mature Teen (16+)
By Hitoshi Tomizawa
CPM Manga Staff
Translator - Laura Jackson & Yoko Kobayashi
Retouch and Lettering by Mark McMurray
Previously...
The world changed when first contact was made with aliens... in a rather bad way.
Ever since then aliens have been coming to the Earth, only to be fought by children.
That's the official story anyway. Truth of the matter is the aliens coming are colonizing the world, and these "invasions" are nothing more than tests by these aliens to find suitable hosts to join with (initiated by the very teachers who were supposed to be looking out for these girls' safety).
To this end we go to Elementary School Nine, in "drill" clan territory, and three new Alien Fighters.
Yuri, Kumi and Kasumi.
Yuri, the weakest of the three... and yet the only one who seemed to maintain her humanity at the end of the year despite the horrors around her. Pushed, driven over the edge, lost her mind once, and almost brainwashed by a different alien clan looking to muscle into the "drill" clan's turf... yet still human.
Or is she?
Kumi. She was attacked by an alien and left for dead, but she was saved by "drill" clan technology which turned her into a "drill" clan borg.
Kasumi. She was joined with a different alien clan called the "YellowKnifes" (when she's merged with the soul of a Yellow Knife that raided the school) which made her capable of resisting the "drill" clan which turns out to be a good thing near the end.
But as the year ends it looks like two of the three are barely holding onto their humanity, yet it seems that Yuri is still human... or is she?
Emulators
Who would have thought that it would continue in Junior High?
Apparently alien "expansion" doesn't end just because Elementary School is over.
With only one Alien Fighter holding her ground in this Junior High she needs backup, and with the three Alien Fighters from Elementary Nine things may turn around.
But when it's discovered the attackers are older "generations" of Drill clan parasites, who seem to be focused on finding what may be the latest "evolution" of hybrid... a Generation Ten hybrid... it comes clear that maybe Yuri didn't get out of Sixth Grade untouched after all as it becomes apparent that she might be this "Tenth Generation" hybrid.
But this year may be far worse than anything that happened in Sixth Grade, with jealousy, betrayal, death, violence and what may be heartbreaking endings... this will not go well.
What may very well be the end of the series (which I think it is) we come to a drastic close, and a dark one.
Oh, and there's LOTS of room at the end to see what happened to the teachers from the first three books when they were Alien Fighters. It ends here, and it ends dramatically.
Alien Nine Breakdown
This time out I can't break it down... why?
To be honest I had a very strong reaction to the end of the series, to the point that breaking it down will probably reveal too much spoilers about the end.
What I can say is that this makes what happened before pale in comparison as we wrap the series and bring it all to a conclusion. But due to my reaction to the end, and certain... well... objections I have to the way it ends? It would reveal too much to you to say more.
This is dark, a train wreck, and yet amazing and marvelous all at once.
Something worth having in your collection, four books at once.
Pick it up if you can. Well worth it in my opinion.