Gaznar Plague

A pathogen that was originally found in an asteroid sector of the Zar Belt known as Gaznar.

The Gaznar plague is only capable of infecting Harkas. It would make use of their gene splicing ability to allow itself to reproduce very rapidly. The plague evolved to take over the splicing gland to reproduce in very large quantities. Its genome was designed to be inserted into other creatures, particularly the harkas, by its host. In order to force its host to infect other harkas, it would interfere with a person's brain and make them desire to insert the Gaznar plague DNA in other harkas hosts. It was thus capable of spreading very fast. If the Gaznar ends up in a non-harkas host, it will attempt to reproduce on its own but cause little harm to the host. 

Upon penetrating the skin of a harkas, the Gaznar will travel directly to the splicing gland through the bloodstream. Upon arrival it will initially render the splicing gland non functional and often numb as it disconnects nervous system connections, taking it over themselves. After rendering the host almost completely unable to use it, the Gaznar plague will immediately begin using it to print massive quantities of Gazner plague DNA, massively increasing its scale. At this point, the plague would have established a significant foothold at the gene splicing gland so some cells are sent towards the harkas' brain to force them to insert the Gaznar into other harkas. As such, the Gaznar is not normally fatal but it ruins a person's bioengineering ability for life, even if they later heal and eliminate the Gaznar from their body. Sometimes it can kill the host unintentionally by interfering with the brain too closely, so it evolved to be vary careful when manipulating the brain. 

Modern harkas knowledge and bioengineering means that any person can have very advanced immune systems. As such, the plague remains a very rare occurrence, now mostly inhabiting the bodies of non-harkas as dormant forms, using these non-harkas as carriers. If it does come into contact with harkas, almost all of the population now have this very advanced immune system which allows them to deal with this problem easily. The Gaznar plague is evolving for prolonged life in non-harkas hosts and may use those as its primary host in the future rather than the harkas. The harkas also gave their bioships, pets, other purposed organisms, ect, similarly advanced immune systems.