Spathi

The Spathi are a race of sentient mollusks from the Star Control games, who describe themselves as "combining the best features of a clam and a Dravatz" (though they don't elaborate on what a Dravatz is). Their entire species is cowardly to the point of paranoia; they managed to advance from the Bronze Age to the Atomic Age over the course of an Earth century just to get away from a vicious, insatiable predatory animal known as "The Evil Ones", and they live in constant fear of a nebulous alien race they call "The Ultimate Evil", which they are convinced lurk just beyond the range of their sensors.

The Spathi have been the victims of several Umgah pranks. Many Star Control fans believe it was the Umgah who introduced "The Evil Ones" to the Spathi homeworld of Spathiwa (since a conversation with the Spathi Ruling Council in Star Control 2 revealed that "The Evil Ones" were not native to Spathiwa). The Umgah were certainly behind a Hyperwave broadcast warning of "The Grand Master Planet Eaters" that sparked mass hysteria in the Spathi that resulted in the deaths of thousands. And it was an Umgah who told the Ur-Quan, after the Spathi surrendered to them, that the Spathi wanted to become Battle Thralls rather than a fallow slave race (and thus be safely encapsuled behind an impenetrable force field for all time).

Despite the race's cowardice (or perhaps because of it), the Spathi Eluder is one of the best ships in Star Control 2. The Eluder (known as the Discriminator in the original Star Control) is incredibly fast and maneuverable, and while the main weapon is quite useless, the Eluder's secondary weapon is a powerful rear-firing homing missile (humorously named the Backwards Utilized Tracking Torpedo, or B.U.T.T.)