There are over a billion sapient species in the known galaxies, and at least a hundred times that many languages.

Most peoples use their tongues and teeth to exchange pleasantries, conduct trade, and complain about the state of their world politics; however, the spoken word is not the only way that beings have evolved to communicate. Many cultures communicate through gestures made with hands, tentacles, or other appendages, and a few even communicate telepathically. But sign language and mind-melding are far from the strangest communication methods evolution has bestowed upon us. Here are four of the most insane ways beings across the multiverse shoot the shit.

1. They choke each other.

If you live on any of the civilized, oxygen-atmosphere worlds, chances are, you have met an Alquintian. Alquintians are an extremely enterprising race of people who trace their origins to the planet Hotron 9. These beings have a really interesting communication method. They have no ability to speak, but are able to hear and understand the speech of others. Nowadays, Alquintians communicate to non-Alquintians via a special device, worn at their throats, that broadcasts the Alquintian's ideas and responses to the listener in any one of several hundred thousand common languages. But it was not always so.

When Intergalactic Fleet Admiral Thaddeus Flarx led an expedition to Hotron 9, the world was wrongly thought to be uninhabited. So when he met a native Alquintian, Flarx was taken by surprise. But when the heavily bejeweled, four-eyed being put her hands about his neck and squeezed, he was positively flummoxed. Fearing for his life, the Admiral unholstered his beamer and shot the Alquintian dead on the spot.

It was only later discovered that the Alquintian race communicates by means of vibrating nodes about the base of the neck. The listener touches the nodes of the speaker with his or her sensitive fingers, and is able to understand a wide range of ideas that might be conveyed through vibratory signals. Unfortunately, the discovery was made too late for Flarx. The Alquintian whom he had shot was a niece of the queen, who punished the poor Admiral severely for his ignorance, impressing him into the service of her royal harem.

2. They send and receive messages through their root systems.

When the Pomm, a species known foremost for its skill with woodworking, first set foot on a small, green planet in the backwater regions of the Ghar system, they thought they had hit the motherlode. The entire planet was covered with tall and sturdy trees that, when felled, provided some of the richest wood ever seen in any of the galaxies. The Pomm named the planet W'anzh'en (a Pommian word meaning "jackpot!"), and set to work straight away, cutting down trees and making all manner of fine furniture, cabinetry, and fancy inlaid salad bowls.

What the Pomm didn't know was that the trees of W'anzh'en were actually people. W'anzh'en's tree-people communicate with each other by sending messages through complex, interconnected root networks. Pommian invasion might have spelled the end for this ancient and venerable tree-race, if one of the tree-people had not figured out how to send a message to the Pomm via the roots of a parrot plant brought to the planet by one of the Pommian woodworkers.

You may have seen a parrot plant before at a zoo or arboretum. They are quasi-sentient houseplants known for their warbly singing, as well as their ability to reproduce the sounds in their environment. After years of attempts, the tree-people of W'anzh'en finally succeeded in breaching this particular parrot plant's pot, connecting their roots together, and teaching it to convey messages to the Pomm. In this way, a very awkward conversation was held in which the Pomm were informed that they had been committing unintentional genocide for the past several years.

Awkward.

And, worse, the Pomm learned that they would no longer be able to harvest wood for their ornately carved footstools without violating the Intergalactic Pact for Not Murdering Sapient Lifeforms.

The Pomm regretfully vacated W'anzh'en after this revelation, but were later required by Intergalactic Court to pay restitution to the tree-people, in the form of twenty thousand shiploads of compost.

3. They scribble in the dirt.

It was long thought impossible for a species to develop writing without first having evolved the ability to speak. And it is true that this backwards type of advancement is rarely found among the sapient races of the galaxies. But the Yk, a nomadic culture of the planet Bane, have proven the exception to the rule.

Bane is a planet rife with danger. There are monstrous creatures on land, sea, and in the air that could eat a Terran whale in one bite and then use a member of any one of the sapient bipod species as a toothpick. There is a consensus among anthropologists that the Yk people simply should not be, because no species should have been able to find enough time to evolve sapience under the constant threat of being eaten by a ravenous beast the size of an interstellar junk barge, and twice as ugly.

Of course, the consensuses of anthropologists should be taken with a grain of salt. Recent research indicates that it may have been precisely because of their terrifying circumstances that the ancestors of the Yk learned to communicate in writing.

Because Bane's predators rely on their incredible sense of hearing to locate their prey, it was necessary to be very, very quiet in order to survive. This imperative ruled out learning to communicate in the normal way--by talking. Instead, ancient Yk people learned to write pictographic messages in the sand or mud, using the slender points of their forelegs. (It has been surmised that this technique was preferred because it is much quieter that the scratching of pen on paper.) Fascinatingly, the Yk perfected their writing skill so early on in their evolution that they never developed vocal cords, or any other means of communication.

4. They fart at each other.

You know how no one ever wants to vacation on Nzitk, even though from the holopics, you'd think it was the most gorgeous planet in the world?

Yeah. There's a reason for that.

The Nzitki method of communication doubles as a highly effective tourist repellent. They are the only known sapient species in the galaxies that communicate solely through smell. To say "How do you do?", a Nitzkian raises his sphincter (located in the center of the abdomen), and lets out a stream of fragrant condensed gas. The recipient of the greeting sniffs the emanation, and releases a cloud of gas in response, which may mean something like "I'm quite well, and you?" or "I'll be a lot better once this damned campaign season is over."

All Nitzkians possess an olfactory super-strength, enabling them to detect minor differences in each other's gaseous communiques that create subtle variations in tone and emotion. Interpreters have hailed them as masters of poetry and sarcasm. But to most other species, all Nitzki messages smell the same: like a hot wind of morning breath. Blowing over a sewer. Into a pit of worm-infested carcasses.

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Thank you for reading!

Stay tuned for more. I publish Intergalactic Clickbait articles each Wednesday!

Hi! I'm Leslie Starr O'Hara, but my friends call me Starr. I live in the mountains of North Carolina and I write funny fiction and satire here on Steemit. Follow me if you want to laugh your britches off!