What do you want?

That's not much of a greeting!

We're humans from Earth, of the League of Sentient Races. We come in peace. How may we classify you, fellow sentient?

What is your problem?

Ahhh... you waste our valuable time. Begone.

Oh, come on. What's the rush? We're neighbors, for Pete's sake!

We are unfamiliar with this "Pete" deity of yours. But we must go.

Come on, Mr. Sunshine. At least tell us the name of your race.

At least tell us the name of your race!

Ahhhh..... We are the Harika and the Yorn.

Wait. Are you the Harika? And where are the Yorn?

That's a funny name for a race. What's it mean?

Are you the Harika or Yorn or both?

I am Harika. He is Yorn.

Who? The fuzzballs in your pocket?

Wait. Those little living twinkies you are eating are part of your RACE?

Yes.

Are they sentient?

You're not killing intelligent creatures, are you?

Yes.

How could you be eating part of your race?

It is essential.

That's... odd.

That's nice.

We are not interested in your opinion, human.

That's disgusting!

That's EVIL!

Care to explain that?

Bah! I have neither the time nor the patience to explain it to you.

Well, this is your lucky day. You get to join the League, and you get to stop eating those little Yorn guys.

We offer you membership in the League of Sentient Races.

You know, we can't let you join the League till you stop eating those little Yorn guys.

Your offer does not concern us. We have no interest in your League.

Why not?

You don't know what you are passing up.

The League can protect you.

We are part of the Hegemonic Crux.

Oops. Imagine my embarrrassment.

I do not care to do any such thing. You waste my precious time with your silly banter!

The Hegemonic Crux sounds like bad news.

We are not a friendly race! We crush all who get in our way!

Yeah, sure. But do you commit acts of genocide or slavery?

Not yet. But we would to end the Plague!

So do we. I mean, the Crux are genocidal slavers.

Look, the Crux are no friends of yours.

All who try to cure the plague are friends of ours!

Plague? What plague?

I have no time to explain any such things to the likes of you!

Come on. We'll help cure the plague too. So you can be our friend, too!

Really? OK, then we are trying to cure the plague, too.

OK. Fine. Leave. I guess we can't help you find a cure, then.

You dare mock me? While our race dies? Look at our planets! On all our worlds, the Harika have fallen into comas! Without the Harika to eat the Yorn, the Yorn now breed out of control!

They rapidly deplete the remaining food stocks, and on many continents, they are beginning to die slow, lingering, torturous deaths from starvation!

The ground is littered with their corpses, and they die faster than they can be buried. And you waste my time with mockery? Get out of my sight!

Whoa! I'm serious. We'll look for a cure, too.

OK. I won't help you then. Too bad. Because my tech teams are pretty brilliant.

Your race has the merest fraction of the brilliance of the Daktaklakpak. You insult us to pretend you can help. You think you are clever, but you are a fraud!

This is a trick! A trick to drive a wedge in the Crux! To make us doubt. A whisper of doubt grows into a roar, until it is all we can hear! And then we lose our edge in battle! Your trick will not work!

OK. If you want to turn down our aid, that's your business.

Sure I want to stop the Crux. But only because I want to help all the other races in the quadrant. And the galaxy!

Your aid is nothing to us.

Be that way, cranky-pants. But when we cure the plague, I'll have to say "I told you so!"

Jeeze! What a grouch! Always thinking the worst of people. What a cynic.

Arrrgh! Trivialities! You waste our patience with such petty banter! I have no time to coddle you.

Time and patience aren't Harika strong suits, are they?

Arrr! You have pushed us too far!

I know that your deadly circumstances make you dangerous to get near. But I'm still going to try to help you.

Huh!

Fine. Who cares? Leave.

Very well. We will leave. Goodbye.

Awright awreddy. I'm gone.

What do you want?

Hail and well met, Harika. How's my favorite Yorn-muncher on this fine day?

Hurrrrrr.... You sicken us! Address both Harika AND Yorn when you speak!

Sure. Hi, Harika. Hi, li'l Yorn guys. Nice to see you. How's tricks?

We want to help you with your deadly predicament.

Yeah, yeah. We know. We won't take up much of your time.

Ahhhhhh.....Again you waste our time with trivialities, while all around us Harika become like unto the living dead. We will not abide your machinations!

It's not trivial to want to help. If you just told us about the Plague, we might be able to assist you.

Ah! We have no more time for this.

Ok. Goodbye.

We know the Daktaklakpak are glad the Harika are dying.

We found out that the Daktaklakpak are glad the Harika are dying.

What? Explain yourself quickly!

The Daktaklakpak said that without a cure, you became more brutal and more willing to die in battle. They liked that.

What?

They also hinted that the search for a cure may remain deliberately inconclusive. They might be hiding a cure, but I don't know for sure. They certainly aren't racing to find it.

We must speak with the Daktaklakpak now!

Wait. How about joining the League?

No.

Goodbye.

Hey, what did the Daktaklakpak say when you told them that you knew their little secret: that they like the way the plague made you more brutal?

That is not for your ears. The matter is settled within the Crux. For now.

Oh, what a crock!

Come on. Tell me.

We're not stopping until we prove it! And save you.

We must go.

Hey! That's no way to thank me! Were you raised in a barn?

You deserve the Daktaklakpak!

Ah! We have no more time for this.

I have evidence that the Crux are responsible for the plague.

You lie! This is a diversionary tactic to divide us! Because of your scurrilous and unsubstantiated outrage I shall rend your ship to pieces.

You'll TRY, Captain Bridgework.

Whoa there. Before you rend, why not listen to the scurrilous substantiation?

You have thirty seconds.

The Daktaklakpak told us that they found some Xchagger microbes, which proved fatal to your people. They said "Conclusion: Enemies can be allied through pain and injury."

This is a very serious accusation! I see no proof. I think you may be lying!

I'm not.

I have no direct proof. But would you rather I waited before I told you?

I thought you should know.

Get out of here now!

Ok. Bye.

I'll help you in spite of yourself.

You're dooming all those cuddly Yorn!

Why are you getting mad at me, you ingrate!

Human! Answer these charges! Are you withholding the salvation of the Harika and Yorn race? For if you are, I pledge to personally slice you from food intake gullet to bile secretion sac!

Whatever are you talking about?

I'm talking about the Xchagger Eradicator Serum! You are keeping it from us!

I've had enough of your tough-guy stuff! Put em up!

We do not want to have to kill you! We want the Xchagger Eradicator Serum!

Then you should act nicer.

Who told you about the Xchagger Eradicator Serum?

You admit you have it!

Oh, blow it out yer exhaust port.

You selfish Harika all deserve to die!

No. Now go away!

We will destroy you and kill the Xchaggers ourselves!

Oh. That.

Give it to us now!

Oh, like I'm really going to confess after a pledge like that!

If I admit it, you'll slice me from food intake gullet to bile secretion sac!

If you give us an Xchagger Eradicator Serum NOW, we may let you live!

Who told you about an Xchagger Eradicator Serum?

Who told you about this?

Hold on, smiley. Cool your jets. Who told you that?

How we found out is not important. Only the Xchagger Eradicator Serum is important!

Oh, no. Who told you this is REAL important. 'Fess up.

Tell us or we'll end this conversation.

Hurrrr..... Ploxis told us.

Ploxis? We can't even find those guys. Do they really exist?

They exist. Now give us the Serum!

You can't trust a thing the Crux says.

Aha! I thought I smelled Crux! You can't trust those guys!

What do you mean? And none of your human tricks!

Human tricks? Me?

Yes! You! You who posses the salvation of the Harika and Yorn and yet CONCEAL it!

Look, consider the source! Those guys poisoned your people with Xchaggers! They'll lie in a heart beat.

And you will not?

I won't lie to you.

I'm not concealing anything.

We don't have any such thing as an Xchagger Eradicator Serum!

We have no such thing!

I'd only lie to save sentient lives.

The Ploxis lied to you!

Uh, good point.

Then tell us truthfully: do you have a cure for our people?

On my honor, we do not.

You lie! Your honor is worthless!

All right. You got me. We do.

Gulp. OK. We do have a cure. But we can't use it.

Oh, OK. We have the cure. But we can't use it.

AHA! So the Ploxis were right! You do have it! Give it to us right now!

Will you join the League if we do?

Yes!

We have found a cure, but we can't use it because making it will kill billions of innocent sentients.

What? You will use it! And NOW!

We can't. We mustn't. It would kill zillions and zillions of Xchaggers.

And withholding it dooms countless Harika and Yorn!

That's the price we have to pay.

Who are you to choose?

I'm the dude with the Precursor ship. Any more questions, coyote-breath?

It is the only JUST decision no matter who chooses.

Sorry. Still can't do it.

Xchagger-lover!

Now, now. Name-calling won't help anyone.

Bah! You have made an enemy this day!

I'm sorry to hear that. But we would not kill you if your deaths would save the Xchaggers.

Enough! I can take no more!

It will be very difficult for us to slay so many Xchaggers, but to save your people we agree to sacrifice the lives of our crew of Xchaggers.

Oh, all right. I'll slaughter Xchaggers so you can live.

Good! We have the serum now. You have spared yourself much grief!

Will you join the League now?

No. We want to put this ugly squabble between you and the Crux far behind us! We thank you for the Cure, but we want no more part of this war.

Come on!

That's not honorable!

Goodbye!

Right now many of the Harika are in comas, and not dying.

But they could die at any time!

That's why we must stop squabbling and look for a REAL cure!

Very well. Would it help your search for a cure if you had some comatose Harika?

Couldn't hurt.

We'll send over five bodies, and their life-support systems. We pray you are sincere about seeking a cure. You did volunteer to tell us about the other cure, after all. You could have concealed it. We will trust you.

We hope to prove worthy of your trust.

Thanks.

Ah, no thanks.

Farewell.

Harika and Yorn! We have the cure for your people!

Stay back, human! We do not trust you after you refused to help us once before!

Come on, guys. Let us go to the infected planets. We can cure them!

OK. If you don't want the cure...

Very well. You may try. We'll be watching carefully.

There are still other Harika planets that need to be cured.

Huh!

You have saved us! You have saved our people!

I'm glad.

Yep. And saved the Xchaggers too.

Not bad for a day's work.

You are a great warrior, for you have the ability to save as well as the ability to kill. We will never forget this.

Shucks.

Thank you. We are glad your people live, and the great plague is past.

We have been deceived by the Crux! They have strewn the planets with the bodies of our people! They have visited untold weeping upon the Harika and Yorn!

We shall tear them to bloody bits and send their juices to crystallize and shatter in the icy void of space!

You're a guy after my own heart.

Your anger is justified, and shared by us.

Hurrr...Would your League interfere with our perpetrating a righteous vendetta against the purveyors of evil?

No way! We'll even help with the perpetratin'!

Of course not.

Then we shall join your League, O great healer!

Poetry to my ears. Care to sign up with the League now?

We shall join your League, O great healer!

Great! You're in!

I formally induct you into the League of Sentient Races.

Ahhh.... We thank you for saving us, noble human. In return we offer our service and fealty! The Harika and the Yorn shall be loyal to the League of Sentient Races now and forever.

Now let's go kick some Crux butt.

Understood. Now let us go forth and crush the Crux!

Before we proceed with our crushing, I have a few questions.

How may we further assist you?

Tell me about the K'tang.

The K'tang are so paranoid about survival that they never trust their safety in any situation in which they cannot fully control the environment, atmosphere, or biohazards.

Therefore, they wear complete environment suits at all times. The suits are not to protect them from us, or their enemies, but from each other.

They can't trust one another, so they never allow the slightest chance for betrayal. They betray at every chance they get, and they expect everyone to be the same. Their distrust of one another has made them highly vulnerable to the manipulations of the Ploxis.

Tell me about the Daktaklakpak.

The Daktaklakpak are far less intelligent than they pretend they are. They have amassed huge collections of Precursor artifacts, but they do not know how to use them.

Tell me about the Ploxis.

We also know that the Ploxis fear you. After the collapse of HyperSpace, they thought they ruled this Quadrant. Then you showed up.

They are terrified of you, and work against you at all times. They boast of how they managed to get one of your races to turn against you. We do not know which race.

Tell me about the Clairconctlar.

We know little about them, save that they would never work for the Crux if the Ploxis had not devised some devious scheme.

Tell me about the Doogs.

The Ploxis cruelly manipulate the gentle and trusting Doogs, but we do not know how.

What Crux secrets do you have that we can exploit?

The Ploxis have a Precursor vessel that they use to transport all the Crux races from system to system. It is their main source of power. Without it they are helpless.

They keep it at the galactic core, protected by a massive anti-matter shield that can instantly vaporize any incoming object.

What do you know about the loss of star systems and the loss of HyperSpace?

The loss of HyperSpace marked the start of the Time of Great Anguish. The Crux had just invaded the Kessarri Quadrant to colonize and look for Precursor artifacts.

We resisted their brutal incursions into our space, and our Ravagers single-handedly fended them off for a long time. Behind the scenes, Yorn diplomats sought to ally us with other Kessarri Quadrant races, like the reclusive Owa and the objectionable Vyro-Ingo.

But then HyperSpace collapsed, and we were fat and helpless targets to the Crux. But still we refused to join them in their conquests. But then the Xchagger plague began, and all Harika who were not aboard Ravagers fell into comas.

The Daktaklakpak promised to find a cure, and we had no choice but to agree. We do not know why or how hyperspace travel collapsed. We think that might be the event that the Precursors feared when they fled.

Are there any other races in this quadrant that might help the League?

The Owa confided the location of their homeworld to us in the strictest confidence. But we owe you our lives, and must trust that you mean all the honorable words you have uttered.

We are now sending your ship the coordinates to Owa Prime, the Owa homeworld on Mnemosyne Epsilon.

What do you know about the Eternal Ones?

We had never heard of them until the Crux arrived. The Daktaklakpak demanded we immediately report any mention of the Eternal Ones. But we never heard any mention of them, until you just said the name.

We suspect that the Daktaklakpak fear them. And we doubt that the Eternal Ones are from this quadrant, or even from this galaxy.

OK, then I command you to stop eating the sentient Yorn.

Don't push it.

OK, OK.

I'm serious as a Harika in a coma, buddy. It stops now.

It cannot stop. We did not explain this to you before, but the Harika and Yorn are symbiotes. We co-evolved, the eater and the eaten.

We resolved our ancient predator-prey relationship in an amicable fashion. We evolved our natural roles to the point that we longer feed on the young, only the healthy adults who have already bred.

The Harika and the Yorn are now almost a hybrid race, and we continue to evolve toward something greater.

Oh. I didn't know that. OK. You don't have to stop eating them.

How could predators have evolved a sympathetic relationship with their prey?

The Harika evolved a sympathetic relationship to the Yorn because we listened to the wisdom of our prey.

The predatory savagery of the Harika is highly self-destructive. We almost destroyed ourselves in global Armageddon until the blessed day that we first began to listen to our food.

The peaceful, contemplative Yorn continue to serve as a moderating influence on the Harika's predatory, antagonistic temperament. For example, during our time in the Crux, the Yorn persistently urged the Harika to talk to the League, and give you a chance to help us.

I guess that makes sense. OK. You can join up.

I see what the Harika get. But what do the poor Yorn get out of this deal?

Many things. The Harika supplement the Yorn's limited mobility, and serve as their hands that take them to the stars.

Well...OK. As long as the Yorn get something out of it. OK. You can join up.

But that's not really symbiosis, is it? Doesn't symbiosis require a physical characteristic?

It requires nothing more that what we wish it to require!

...But, we are evolving some physical connections. Harika have eaten Yorn for so long that Yorn proteins are now the only food that can properly sustain the Harika.

OK. Fine. The Harika can be in the League and still eat the Yorn.

But what do the Yorn get out of being eaten?

The Yorn evolved being eaten by the Harika's primitive ancestors. They evolved an adaptation that causes them to breed in wave after wave of huge litters.

They breed so rapidly that, without the Harika to control their population, their population overruns a planet, exhausting all available food sources in less than a decade. The Yorn were starving and dying in vast and tragic numbers during the Xchagger plague.

Oh. I see. It's OK then. You can join.

Surely you can find a synthetic source of food and the Yorn can find an artificial means to limit their population.

Possibly. But such an intrusion into our evolved life cycle is unnecessary. But that would mean wrenching changes to a system we evolved in pre-historic times. Our twin races co-evolved, much like humans and the intestinal flora that humans use to digest their food.

Sure, but that's a micro-organism, not a sentient creature!

Are you sure? The Daktaklakpak didn't think the Xchaggers were sentient either.

OK. You made your point. You can keep this odd relationship and be in the League.

If we find out that the bacteria in my guts are sentient, I'll... I'll... Gee. I don't know what I'd do.

Hopefully you would listen to them.

Come on! My intestinal microbes are not the subject here. The subject is League rules!

Look, we have rules to uphold!

What do you mean? We break no League rules.

I guess you don't. OK. You can join the League as you are.

The Yorn are still sentient beings. And the League stands for freedom for all sentient races. We allow no slavery and especially no genocide.

We break no League rules. The Yorn are neither slaves nor genocide victims. The Yorn are sentient, but they only die by their own choice.

When an individual Yorn has decided that it has lived a full life and bred as much as it wishes, it initiates a ritual in which it joins with the Harika of its choice.

It goes to its own consumption voluntarily. And some choose never to be consumed. If you would acknowledge and accept their sentience, you must acknowledge and respect their choices.

OK. You can keep your customs and still join the League.

OK. OK. But do you have to eat them alive?

We like being eaten! It is a sublime, majestic process to surrender so fully and completely and to give ourselves to a greater good. Our sacrifice is our exaltation!

I'm running low on arguments here. OK, You can join the League and keep your practices.

Excellent! We applaud your wise choice! Now let us go forth and crush the Crux!

Yikes! OK. It's all right then. But it does creep us out.

Nonetheless, you have to stop it to be in League.

Then we cannot be in the League.

Tell ya what. Let's sleep on it and get back to you.

That's the way it has to be.

Very well. We regretfully say goodbye.

Never mind. I was confused.

Hail, Human Healer!

If you are still eating those Yorn, you still can't join the League.

We regret your choice. Goodbye.

We decided you can keep eating Yorn and be in the League!

Excellent! We applaud your wise choice! Now let us go forth and crush the Crux!

Hail, great Captain and Healer of the Harika and the Yorn!

Just checking in.

Farewell! Let us rend the Crux together!

Hi yourself, great Harika and Yorn! I've got a few questions.

Tell me about the Owa dumping.

The Owa are a secretive race that lives a section of space that is not properly labeled on starcharts because its sun long ago went nova and was extinguished.

The Owa evolved on a water world without benefit of photosynthesis. All life grew from underwater chemical reactions. The Owa have no eyes, and no light-sensing abilities.

What do you know about the Precursors?

We know very little about the Precursors. We know they are more ancient than any other race. We know they built great tools, many of which are still here.

We know they had a great concern for the emerging sentient races. We know they feared the galactic core. And we know they went away and never came back.

What do you know about the Rainbow Worlds?

We do not know what the Rainbow Worlds are, though we have heard legends that they were built by the Precursors for some long-lost purpose.

We know that they may not function properly, since they are now steeped in toxic anti-matter wastes, dumped by the Owa.

Farewell, Harika and Yorn!

We need to collect a little of your sentience for a little experiment we're conducting. It's completely safe.

Very well. You may try. We'll be watching carefully.

Thanks for the sentience, guys!

Stay back, human! We do not trust you after your lies!

Are you ready to die?

Let's not fight. We have so much in common.

Arrr! You waste our time. Defend yourselves or die!