Phamysht

"You must be a Human! I've heard so much about you!"

"Your culture, your texture, your aroma. It's just so exciting meeting a new alien these days!"

"Curiosity is such a delightful trait and I urge you not to give up on it."

-Excerpts from the Phamysht first contact with Humans. The Phamysht are a serpentine species who evolved from arboreal ambush hunters on their homeworld. Due to recent events the Phamysht are an endangered species. While once considered among the galaxy's most civilized species the surviving Phamysht are now known largely as 'space monsters'.

Pre-Sapience
The Phamysht evolved from arboreal ambush hunters on their home world where their pre-sentient selves devoured anything they could catch. They even developed an omnivorous capability to account to early environmental turmoil that could have resulted in extinction. Devouring of mates also occurred, becoming the norm among their ancestors.

Awakening
It was through devising better ambushes and studying prey that the Phamysht developed sentience- it was by consuming their own kind that they developed sapience. The ability to recognize that they where devouring alike individuals and that such individuals likely had thoughts as they do was the start of polite society. During this awakening language started out among kin lines and attempts to woo without being devoured or to offer to share meals to save one's life. With communication focus revolving around eating the concept of table manners and being respectful towards other Phamysht that one preyed upon formed the foundation of their earliest societies.

Civilization
Phamysht society continued to devour others of their kind through out it's pre-space flight history. Clannish nation states formed around Devourers- individuals well versed in culinary knowledge, hunting experience, and social skills- who directed their communities interaction with other polities. Their ethics of polite predation evolved over centuries. The act of killing and eating someone without a word was frowned upon as savage- a remnant of their ambush hunter past. A civilized predator asks another intelligent mind if they can eat them and such is a major tenant of their morality- seen as what separates them from mere beasts. The capacity to devour someone without them feeling pain and still able to have a final conversation was a celebrated medical achievement. This 'mercy' being welcomed and seen as bringing their kind closer together.

The Scryve
During an era comparable to Earth's 1970s the Phamysht encountered their first alien civilization when the Scryve arrived to their world. The Scryve Empire, which admired order, where impressed by the Phamysht culture of that 'late-modern' era. The courteous mentality, elegant sinuous art of the era, and how far the Phamysht had arose from their primal instincts gave the Scryve hope. As relations where going well the Phamysht surprised the Scryve in another way by asking if they could devour one of them. This, sparked a bit of a panic and caused the Phamysht great confusion at the reaction to the request which resulted in the Phamysht being subjugated by the Scryve and cannibalism made illegal on their world for the first time in it's recorded history.

Under Scryve Rule
As subjects of the Scryve the Phamysht retained their own government within the Empire and members of their society became renowned artists- including official sculptors for the leaders of the Empire. Phamysht seemed to have complied fully to the new regulations and traveled freely between imperial worlds as their culture and art continued to be admired. It was in this era that they met other subjects of the Scryve rule. A number of citizens, including members of the planet's aristocracy, found other individuals who had a curiosity regarding being devoured and thus cannibalism resumed in secret. When the Scryve Empire discovered what was going on they where compelled to act. Admiring the Phamysht too much to destroy them, the Scryve blamed the subjects whose members had allowed themselves to be devoured and thus to punish for the Phamysht for being tempted back into the practice opted to exterminate the new 'friends' that Phamysht had made resulting in multiple genocides that the Phamysht had to witness. This effectively ended their attempts to interact with other subjects for fear of causing such death to befall others. In the aftermath Phamysht culture waned in popularity in the Empire and became obscure.

Rebellion
Within Phamysht territory those who had resumed cannibalism continued to do so in secret among their own kind. The Phamysht Lords themselves had fully embraced a return to tradition- though only in private. When the Xraki, an extradimensional race, contacted them asking that the Phamysht rebell against the Scryve the Phamysht where reluctant to do so until an argument was made that it was both dangerous to remain friends of the Scryve and that the Xraki understood more fully what it meant to be a friend. They offered the lords three individuals of another species from the Xraki home dimension and tempted them in this way to agree to rebell in exchange for being able to feed upon as many of those as they could stomach. The gift was accepted and much to the Phamysht Lords dismay the individuals where indigestible and completely incapable of being devoured at all. But as they had given their word they kept the agreement and rebelled- managing to free themselves from the (by then) decaying empire.

A Great Lose
Free the Phamysht resumed a variation of polite cannibalism though one that determined that refusal to give up a crew member for safe passage through the territory meant one was no friend- in fact they where uncivilized. This was due to the relations they had with the Scryve, and the response the new regime had determined was best was to attack and devour- a real degradation of the old values. The Xraki it turned out where not friends at all, and temptation back into primal ways resulted in their undoing. The extradimensional beings swooped in and took all of Phamysht territory as their own for the Scryve Empire had been keeping them from doing so while it held governance in the region. The Xraki killed many, indeed most of the Phamysht population leaving only a few survivors. The experience greatly humbled the surviving Phamysht who then aided the Federation of Allied Species in ending the extra-dimensional threat though with a feeling of great guilt for the direction their civilization had taken. What has become of them since then is unknown.

Apperances

 * Star Control: Origin (first)
 * Galactic Civilizations III: The Villians of Star Control Origins DLC

Source Citation

 * 1) Star Control: Origins