Creature:Ahhc

The Ahhc are a tragic story of the galaxy. Once a great and proud people, they prided themselves on their life support systems; not ones for combat, they remained neutral between the many warring factions, selling their life support systems to any faction that requested them as they believed every race deserved to live. While they did not aid the Chaos Legions (which would have simply absorbed them anyway), they actively sought to find a cure for the ailment that infected the many races, seeing the diimonic mutations as a form of mutagenic disease which they dubbed the "Transmogrific Virus".

While they stated that they were on to something with their viral experiments, tragedy struck - the immune systems of their race was suddenly drastically compromised. At first it was not noticed, and the sickness that spread seemed like a horrible but natural occurrence. As the mortality rates climbed and reached pandemic levels, however, the Ahhc began to panic. They frantically sought a cure and when a cure did not come, they instead moved on to finding a way to simply survive - that took the form of life support harnesses, small life support systems that aided them in movement as their limbs grew weaker and weaker and held them aloft when they ceased to reach adulthood.

Now the Ahhc survive only by their life support harnesses, which keep them alive by "purifying" their blood stream. It is a painful process and only just works, but they continue to thwart extinction. Most of them have paled skin and cloudy eyes due to the most prolific disease that has come to affect their kind; however, this is far from the only look for them; some known diseases to affect them are highly similar to the [{Earth|Earth's]] harlequin-type ichthyosis and elephantiasis. Another disease that affects them as a whole prevents them from sexually maturing, leaving them in their fetal state forever; to combat this they have developed a sort of artificial neoteny, with their life support harnesses taking their DNA and mixing it with that of another of the opposing gender, combining them in a processing vat to give birth to a new member.

It is widely assumed that the Ciitarkians had a hand in the sudden loss of the Ahhc immune system, due to their having performed several other horrible and similar experiments on other races (such as destroying the Snapdragon's homeworld and only colony to see how the peaceful giants would react to such a tragedy). However, no direct correlation between the Ahhc tragedy and the Ciitarkians has ever come to light.

==Sporepedia Descriptions=

Ahhc
"Long ago, the Ahhc suffered from a serious disease that prevented them from carrying young to full-term. It eventually got so bad that fetuses had to be fastened to machines to survive, and this is all that remains of the race; adulthood no longer occurs."

Ahhc Harlequin
"Harlequin Ahhcs are the worst-off of the species. Infected with a congenital ichthyosis, they are badly infected with bacteria.  Their machinery keeps them alive, albeit suffering horribly."