Symbiotes (Descendants of the Parasites)

A Symbiote poses on one of his several hosts. In the background can be seen some of their rural housing, with man-sized doors for the mindless hosts, and the smaller holes for their intelligent patrons.

As time passed, the relationships between the parasites and their hosts got connected to such a degree that it began to involve a co-operation of the individuals. These were no longer single-sided relationships; in exchange for the hosts' nutritious blood, the parasites offered their heightened senses as early warning against predators and other hazards.

A great "arms race" of symbiotic relationships thus commenced. Certain "parasites" offered their hosts larger eyes, others sharper senses of smell, hearing or even additional defensive weapons in the shape of venomous saliva, malodorant sprays or an extra bite. The hosts returned the favor with longer running legs, stronger bodies, and specialized, ergonomic nesting sites rich in blood vessels and covered in insulating fur. Different complexes of parasite and host species evolved, compatible only amongst themselves.

The development of such creatures was in a way reminiscent of the great Modular colonies, thriving on their own world light-years away. But unlike the Modulars, the components of the Symbiotes belonged to different species, instead of modified variations of the same basic organism. In eventuality, both relationships led to the same point: Sentience.

In the secluded forests of a certain continent, a new parasitic species developed. They did not have the ballistic poison sprays, infectious stings or the grossly hypertrophied arm-claws of their relatives. Instead, these parasites offered a simpler bargain; an ability to think in return of total submission. Initially this relationship was more like a horse and its rider, but after a few hundred thousand years the Symbiotes could manipulate their hosts like puppets through a combination of tactile and olfactory signals.

A few more millennia and these combined beings developed an order not unlike our own, complete with countries, politics and even war, albeit reduced in the newly globalizing world-culture. In this age technology filled most functions of the hosts, but a thriving husbandry of these creatures still remained due to tradition and simple efficiency. An average Symbiote would begin the day on his business host, and move onto a more comfortable domestic one when he returned home after work.

And perhaps, on the olfactory television, he would smell news of the excavations of the million-year-old Qu ruins, of the marvelous discoveries salvaged from the Star Men wrecks, or of the enormous radio arrays that rose everywhere to listen to the stars.

It was a pattern that was being repeated all over.