Hekkret

Hekkret is a drug, or set of drugs, developed by the Chatcaava.

As a Recreational Drug

For Chatcaavans, hekkret is a recreational drug in the barbiturate family. It can be consumed by them in this capacity in several ways, including thin cigarette-like rolls and incenses used to permeate a room. Males who indulge smoke hekkret rolls, which is considered somewhat reckless as their anxiolytic and hypnotic effects reduce a Chatcaavan's alertness and reaction time. This can be used as a sign that a male considers himself so powerful that others are no match for him even when he has smoked the hekkret. Males also use hekkret incense to sedate females, especially if they are too lazy to discipline their harem themselves. Recreational hekkret is inexpensive and easy to obtain; the Queen had some readily available for Lisinthir. It is also physiologically and psychologically addictive.

Hekkret, used recreationally, relieves anxiety and produces a sense of relaxation, ease, and fluidity. Perceptions become dreamlike and sensationsseem to be coming from a distance. Hekkret rolls smoked for this purpose are narrow and contain little of the plant, and come in packs, sometimes with their own lighters.

As a Poison

Hekkret is also notable as it is a reliable poison for non-Chatcaavans. Many Chatcaavan poisons don't work on aliens, or work unreliably, but hekkret in its various preparations is reliable if in strong enough doses. Furthermore, hekkret is processed in different ways to achieve different effects--not just as a smoke or incense but as a liquid or in other forms--but is easily deadly to most aliens. While there are antidotes, someone must know what preparation they were dosed with to select the correct antidote and antidote dosage, and the antidotes by themselves can cause damage.

Non-Chatcaavans can build resistance to hekkret over time by taking light doses. In fact, those with alien slaves are cautioned against using hekkret incense to drug them as they would a Chatcaavan female, because they would develop a partial immunity--though the Surgeon warned that the immunity was very much only partial, and that strong doses could still kill. Symptoms of hekkret overuse (whether recreational or from poisoning) in aliens include rapidly becoming out of breath, vomiting blood, broken blood vessels in the eyes, and a general air of exhaustion and malaise. As Lisinthir said, "The cure in this case is only an inch better than the disease."

Specific Uses

Several Alliance ambassadors returned from their mission to the Chatcaavan Empire early because they developed mild illnesses; the Queen suspected that they had been mildly poisoned with hekkret to chase them off.

After he became aware that Second was attempting to poison him with hekkret, Lisinthir began smoking the hekkret to develop an immunity, as well as reducing how much he ate. He quickly developed a physiological dependency on it, which caused him significant health problems, but did protect him from at least one potentially-fatal hekkret poisoning.