Enmerkar

**The Enmerkar** were a species of eusocial colonial organisms that once inhabited a portion of what is now the Bedran Marches. They were driven to extinction at the end of a prolonged and bloody war with the Kith. Their name for themselves is unknown, but in the Bedran language, their name means "sandstorm."

## Biology

The Enmerkar consisted of many millions of individual organisms physically connected to form a larger body. These individuals vaguely resembled microscopic ants, and independently possessed rudimentary insect instincts. When connected into a colony, however, they formed a gestalt intelligence akin to a hive mind. These in turn became more intelligent the larger the colony grew.

Specialized individuals performed different functions throughout the colony, mimicking certain cellular functions in multicellular organisms. Many of these individuals were bioluminescent. The color of their bioluminescence denoted the colony's age and social standing. These ranged from reds and oranges in younger colonies to mature blues and purples to the stark ultraviolet of queens.

Enmerkar were biologically immortal. A colony would continue to expand until portions of it broke away, forming new colonies. These new colonies were subservient to the larger, older "parent" colony. Subsequent generations would in turn remain loyal to their ancestor colony through their own parent colonies. Particularly old, massive ancestor colonies were known as "queens", and could have millions of younger colonies serving them.

The nature of the Enmerkar meant their colonies could rapidly take any form the hive mind wished. They were shapeshifters, able to grow new appendages and retract others near-instantly. They were incredibly strong and durable, able to rip through advanced metals and ignore most conventional ballistics. Enmerkar could move almost faster than the eye could follow, resembling a whirlwind of tendrils and torn-up dirt.

While they were immune to age, the Enmerkar were not invulnerable. Starvation, disease and violence could all harm and even kill a colony. A colony that lost a significant number of its individuals too quickly would lose its hive mind, causing the remaining individuals to go into catatonic shock. Death usually followed, and and a colony that survived to re-emerge usually regressed to a feral, predatory state. In addition, the Enmerkar were psycho-chemically linked to their parent colony, and especially their queen. The loss of a parent colony would cause confusion and loss of cohesion, and the loss of a queen caused all connected colonies to enter a catatonic state, remaining dormant until the colony starved.

## Society

The Enmerkar were matriarchal, ruled by their queens. These queens, which numbered in the hundreds, voted on matters involving the species as a whole. Beyond that, each queen ruled over her brood with impunity. Only the queens were capable of true, independent thought. All other Enmerkar, while intelligent, were merely servants of their queen.

Records are scarce, but the queens seemed to worship an entity known as the "Empress". The Empress was, presumably, the original colony from which the queens were spawned. This would have made the Empress the ancestor of the entire species and possibly the first colony ever.

As a species, the Enmerkar were not inherently aggressive. They were isolationists, content to ignore the other sapients of the galaxy, and be ignored in turn. However, the queens were fiercely protective of each other, as they could not replace a queen and her brood once it was lost. The loss of a queen provoked a species-wide frenzy borne of anguish and vengeance. They would attack the fallen queen's murderers until the guilty party was slain. Before the Kith, queens were only killed by other rogue queens. This meant the Enmerkar would attack until the responsible queen was slain and her brood rendered catatonic.

Due to their nature, their homeworld achieved a one-world government early in their history. Because of this, and because of the Enmerkar's non-aggressive nature and lack of tribal mentality, there was no pressure to innovate quickly in order to gain a competitive advantage over others. Enmerkar technology, while highly advanced at the time of their extinction, developed extremely slowly. The Enmerkar themselves were also slow to adapt.

## History

### Early History

The origins of the Enmerkar are lost to history. Ancient Klemorian records suggest they were aware of the Enmerkar's existence, and that the species was already "of old date and well established" by first contact. The Enmerkar were possibly one of the earliest interplanetary species. It is not known if the Klemorians had any interactions with the Enmerkar before the former's civil war and subsequent collapse.

The next verified time a sapient race encountered the Enmerkar was in 90 BBA. Early Kith freeholders encountered and accidentally killed an Enmerkar colony on Acre when they drilled into the queen's underground chamber and burned her to death with their plasma borers. The connected colonies withered and died without the Kith noticing. But the esoteric connection between the Enmerkar queens alerted the rest of the species immediately, prompting a mobilization of war.

### Enmerkar War: 90-1 BBA

Acre was quickly set upon, and the Kith freeholders were massacred. That might have been the end of it, had a resupply frigate from a neighboring Freehold colony not arrived on the scene while the Enmerkar were still present. The ship was captured, and the coordinates of its home colony discovered. The Enmerkar promptly assaulted Ishtar, a much more densely populated colony. The results were the same, and the Kith Freehold became aware that they were at war.

For nearly a century, the Enmerkar besieged the Freehold. They were determined to find and punish the offending "queen", unaware that the Kith had nothing of the sort. Indeed, the Kith were as alien to the Enmerkar as the Enmerkar were to the Kith. The Enmerkar did not understand that the Kith were multicellular organisms with individuality, nor that the Kith were not actively hostile towards them. They treated the Kith the only way they knew how: as a rogue brood.

One by one, the Freehold worlds were picked off. The Kith were brave, but naïve and inexperienced with war on such a scale. For every battle they won, they lost five. The Enmerkar had them beat in numbers, technology and ferocity. A single enraged colony could rip through a dozen Kith and more before being gunned down. Kith ships were brought down with accelerated asteroids and plasma projectors.

The Kith developed the Leto Decree, which decreed that ships in danger of being boarded or captured were to delete all coordinates to Freehold colonies and make randomized blind jumps before returning to Freehold space. This slowed down the rate at which the Enmerkar discovered new worlds, but did not stop them. Many colonies simply ceased contact, leaving their fates uncertain. In time, the Freehold was whittled down to just a handful of colonies. In time, these too fell.

By the war's twenty-first year, all that remained of the Freehold was Nammu, the natal homeworld of the Kith. With no other option, the Kith ceased all interstellar travel, isolating themselves from the galaxy and praying the Enmerkar would not find them. Their prayers were in vain, for the Enmerkar eventually tracked down the Kith homeworld and prepared to annihilate it.

### Enmerkar War: 0 BBA - 5 ABA

It was at this moment, when all hope seemed lost, that a miracle came. Bedras appeared to the Kith. With a gesture, the Enmerkar ships were annihilated, including the queen which led them. The revelation of Bedras stunned and enraptured the Kith. They pledged Bedras as their savior and general. With the mind and abilities of a god, he gifted the Kith with great innovations in technology, tactics and doctrine. The Kith underwent a massive reform over the span of five years while the Enmerkar reeled from the sudden extinction of another hive.

When the Enmerkar launched a second attack on Nammu in 5 ABA, the Kith were ready. The invading hive fleet was stonewalled on land and in space by the better-trained and better-equipped Kith. With Bedras spearheading the defense and subsequent counterattack, the tides turned in favor of the Kith for the first time since the war began. The Second Battle of Nammu lasted three weeks, and ended with the destruction of the queen's ship, and afterwards the death of the hive. The Kith were victorious, and with fewer losses than any previous battles with the Enmerkar.

### Enmerkar War: 6 ABA - 20 ABA

The Kith's crushing first victory over the Enmerkar awakened something in them. Fueled by the first taste of hope in generations, and the revelation that they were strong enough to fight. The Kith were consumed by the war-lust that had plagued the early civilizations since time immemorial. They desired vengeance. They would claim it.

The remnants of the Enmerkar fleet were scavenged. Much of the alien technology was incomprehensible to their scientists, but innovations in weaponry and space propulsion were achieved with the help of Bedragare. Better, the Kith were able to learn more about their enemy than they had in the entire war beforehand. New tactics to combat them were adopted. Weaknesses were discovered. In the span of just a year, the Kith were ready.

With Bedragare as their commander, the Kith spread out from Nammu with a sudden, desperate violence. The Kith were not prepared for the speed and ferocity of such a counterattack. They were left reeling after each queen that was killed. And the sedentary ways of the Enmerkar meant they could not adapt their tactics nearly as fast as their adversaries. They had lost the advantage.

Even so, the Enmerkar were many and vicious. They put up such a fight as had not been seen in the galaxy before. And their colonies were slaughtered in numbers not matched since.

World by world, the Kith took the Freehold back. Since the death of a queen meant the death of her entire brood, worlds were deemed safe for recolonization mere months after they were retaken. The Kith spread back out as the frontline pushed further away from Nammu. This quick dispersion from their homeworld was what saved the Kith from the Enmerkar's greatest attack.

### Ur-Nammu

In 21 ABA, Nammu was struck by a minor planet taken from the system's asteroid belt and accelerated at the planet by the Enmerkar. The Enmerkar still believed the laws of their own species applied to the Kith. They believed targeting their enemies' homeworld and destroying the Kith "queens" would end the war once and for all. The decision anguished the Enmerkar, but they considered it necessary for the survival of their own kind.

The impact shattered Nammu's crust. The oceans boiled and the atmosphere turned black with smoke and ash. Nothing survived, not even bacteria. The Kith homeworld was annihilated.

The Enmerkar still believed what they had done was the right thing for their species. They thought the war had ended. But they had only made it far, far worse.

### Enmerkar War: 21 ABA - 90 ABA

The Kith did not all die with their homeworld. Billions did. Their center of industry, their source of fresh troops. Up until that point, it had been a mad blitzkrieg against the Enmerkar. But in one cataclysmic moment, the Kith had lost nearly their entire species. Their advance ground to a halt.

But they did not die. Instead, they hated.

What was a war of retribution became a jihad: a religious war of persecution against the Enmerkar. The species that had taken everything from them. The Kith resolve had been galvanized. They would not stop until every last Enmerkar had paid in blood.

But despite their hatred, the Kith were not foolhardy. They had been dealt a devastating blow, and needed to recuperate and strategize a new plan.

On the other side, the Enmerkar were astonished that their enemy had not died out. Trepidation overtook the queens as it became apparent they had no idea of the capabilities of their enemies. The Kith were alien to them. The notion came to them that their normal tactics would not work. But the Enmerkar were slow to change. Their own counterattacks slowed as the queens tried to find a new solution.

What was once blitzkrieg became a war of attrition. The Enmerkar with their endless legions. The Kith with their superior fighting ability and resolve. The war became one of generations. Planets were reclaimed, lost and reclaimed again by both sides. The war's end stretched out toward the distant horizon.

But the Kith had one thing the Enmerkar did not: Bedras. His mind and might were the saving grace of the Freehold. Alone, he slew millions of colonies. With the Kith at his backing, Bedras faced down the Enmerkar and overtook them.

Nearly two centuries passed since first contact at Acre. Hundreds of billions of Kith had died in the conflict, and far more Enmerkar. But tempered in war unending, the Kith grew only more superior to their stagnant enemy. Technology fueled by conflict leapt forward in an era of revolution. Kith culture became centered on war. All of their pre-war innocence had evaporated. The Enmerkar could not match. Each queen that died meant another bloodline lost, and the other queens could not fill the gap fast enough. Their vengeful wrath was gone. In its place, they felt fear, true and deep.

In 86 ABA, the Enmerkar had been completely ousted from the Freehold. Their territories, which lay close to the galactic core, were left vulnerable for the first time in the species' history. Their tactics became totally defensive, and the queens hoped their enemy's bloodlust had finally been sated.

But it was not to be.

The Kith push into Enmerkar territory was the final and bloodiest offensive of the war. The Enmerkar worlds had been fortified with vast STO emplacements, and their warrens stretched beneath the surface for kilometers. Few battles in the later Godwar conflict ever matched the sheer brutality of the siege of Enmerkar space.

### Extinction

In 90 ABA, the Kith at last came upon the natal world of the Enmerkar. Twelve queens remained. Twelve bloodlines where once had been hundreds. On a societal and ecological level, the Enmerkar had been devastated. But the Twelve were the oldest, wisest and most powerful of their whole species. While they lived, they hoped. They knew then that their options were peace or extinction. And they had made one innovation that the Kith had not.

When the fleets arrived, the Twelve revealed their final, most important invention: a way to communicate with the Kith. A translation device that made speaking with their enemy, so vastly different to them biologically, a possibility for the first time since first contact. They used it to broadcast a single word to the entire Kith fleet.

"*Peace.*"

Then something happened. Bedras, the hero of the Freehold and the greatest slayer of the Enmerkar in the alien species' history.... agreed.

Bedras was wise, powerful and compassionate. He had promised to save the Kith from their fate out of compassion. That same compassion mixed with pity and war fatigue came to him when the Twelve reached out to him. And with it came realization of just what he had done to the Kith.

He had made them strong, yes. But he had neglected to teach them how to wield that strength. It was not with temperance and responsibility, but with vengeance and hate that they waged war. With such anger and such power, they would scorch the galaxy and trample it and all its denizens beneath their armored heels. And Bedragare knew he had made a grave error.

He came before the admiralty and the generals. Before all of the officers of the Kith and broadcasted across the entire fleet. Before his men, Bedras pleaded on behalf of the Enmerkar.

The Enmerkar fought for the same reasons the Kith had. They had lost. They had admitted their defeat and had thrown themselves on their enemy's mercy. Had the tables been turned, would not the Kith have begged the same? Justice, Bedras urged, was superior to vengeance. The enemy had been defeated. Now was the time to make peace.

But in those days, the Kith still saw Bedras as a man. And the scars of war were too deep. For Nammu; for every world; for every life; for every wound and moment of horror.... the Kith demanded recompense. And no punishment was too great.

The Twelve received their answer, nearly two hundred years after the war began. It came in fire from the sky. An orbital bombardment that rained down on the planet, pulverizing it to the mantle. For four days, a hundred thousand ships rained down centuries of Kith hatred.

When the dust settled, the Twelve queens - and the entire Enmerkar species - were dead.

## Legacy

There was no Victory day for the Enmerkar war. No jubilation and merrymaking. The Kith had killed their enemy to the last. But they felt no elation. For those who had watched the Enmerkar homeworld be razed to the ground, they only felt empty. When they looked upon Bedras, they were shocked to see him grieving for their enemy.

In time, the hate bled from their veins. They had lived to see their enemy be wiped from the galaxy. With no more fuel to feed their rage, it burned out. In time, the empty space that had been left behind slowly became filled with the same sorrow their hero felt.

In the centuries and millennia that followed, the extinction of the Enmerkar would become the greatest shame of the Kith, and later the Bedran. A cautionary tale and a sobering reminder of the consequences of extreme measures in wartime. The Enmerkar were the first species the Bedran had ever wiped out. Fate willing, they would be the last.

Monuments to their civilization still stand. The great spire-hives of Acre are a galactic heritage site and a national monument of the Bedran Marches, dutifully maintained by servitor droids. The technology scavenged from them would form the basis of modern Bedran weaponry, and helped the Bedran refine their understanding of FTL travel. Enmerkar social structure was studied intensely and eventually formed the basis of the earliest forms of the Nomarchy. Nammu was eventually terraformed back into habitability and christened "Ur-Nammu," but would never again be the garden that it once was.

The Enmerkar are today viewed in a tragic light by most of the galaxy. They were not evil. They fought for what they thought was best. And they lost.