Editing Harlequin (section)

== Eldar Ambassadors? ==
[[Image:Harlequin.jpg|They actually are this hot in the setting, but most people are too busy screaming in pain or fear to comment on it.|thumb|right]]
Harlequins do not necessarily restrict their visits to the Eldar. In the Harlequins' view, they must perform their work for anyone and everyone who may benefit and learn the lessons from The Fall. Thus it is very rare, but not unknown, for Harlequin troupes to visit Imperial worlds. However, it must be noted that given the Imperium's strict policy of xenophobia, the circumstances under which such visits occur almost always coincide with the absence of strict Imperial oversight.

Of course, given the inscrutable nature of Eldar language and art, it is highly debatable whether or not a human audience would even be able to grasp the message that a Harlequin performance was attempting to convey. Most accounts of Harlequin performances amount to something like splatterhouse Shakespeare, with chainsword wielding [[Coenobite]] clowns flinging psychedelic rainbow viscera while the audience trips out on peyote. On the other hand, it is conceivable that Harlequins adjust their performance based on the audience, keeping the performance elaborate in form, but simple in message, thus allowing humans to understand the Great Enemy and what can be done.

In any event, by the time Imperial authorities become fully aware of the presence of a Harlequin troupe, the xenos have inevitably departed. Given the isolated nature of many imperial worlds and the Imperial policy of enforced ignorance, most common inhabitants might find the harlequins as just another passing troupe of strange, incredibly skilled artists, unaware for the most part of their xenos nature. Furthermore, since harlequins only need a webway portal instead of say, a massive starship to get onto a world, no one really discovers they have been in a close encounter of the third kind, at least until some Ordo Xenos operative takes notice. Thus, while in theory Harlequins (as xenos) are not welcome on Imperial worlds, in practice the Imperium can generally do little to stop such visitations.

Another explanation is that while the Ordo Xenos may not be fans, the Ordo Malleus is fully aware that the Eldar know more about Chaos than they do, and that the Harlequins fight Chaos as agents of the Black Library. The Inquisition's desire to obtain that knowledge is therefore probably enough to make them pressure everyone else into not doing anything rash, as long as the Eldar behave as well.

More cynical view is that the clowns actually fully expect the Imperial authorities to take issue and initiate the usual response, and use this to bait to come investigate and either discover some other threat, like a clandestine Chaos cult, or sweep it in the collateral damage.

Judging from their allies matrix, it's fortunate that humans at least sometimes listen to them (so far as humans listen to any Eldar, anyway), since on the Tau worlds they visit they are inevitably met with an endless earful about the fucking Greater Good. They don't play on Necron [[Tomb World|Tomb Worlds]] (no shit?) given that the Necrons are the oldest foes of the Eldar and the two have brought each other nothing but grief over the last few million years, and Harlequins work to fight against them just as hard as they do against Chaos. Don't even fucking ask if they play on Ork worlds (you know, they probably do, but have to reduce the dialogue to indecipherable grunting, swearing and cockney slang). It's presumed that they did try to play for the [[Tyranid]]s only once, but found out the space bug-lizards have no appreciation for art; hence the decision to put the Tyranids right next to Chaos and the Necrons on the mandate to kill-on-sight-and-annoy-the-hell-out-of.

During [[The War of The Beast]], [[Eldrad|Eldrad Ulthran]] sent a troupe of Harlequins to convey a message to the [[God-Emperor of Mankind]], letting Him know that Chaos had to be treated as the primary threat and that the [[Imperial Fists]] successor chapters were on their way. Quite why he thought that anyone would care about the first half of the message whilst the Imperium was literally facing total annihilation at the hands of The Beast no one but Eldrad knows. In another fantastic demonstration of Eldar logic, the Harlequins he sent thought that the best way to pass the message along was to butcher 99% of the Humans they came across whilst shouting "Friendship! Friendship!" Understandably they didn't find willing ears whilst they were eviscerating [[Imperial Guard|Guardsmen]] and [[Adeptus Custodes|Custodians]]. In fairness the humans likely wouldn't have listened anyway but the Eldar plan was definitely the worst one they could have possibly went with considering all that it got them was meeting their end before the Eternity gate. Props for getting that far though. All of them wound up getting [[RIP AND TEAR|massacred]] eventually by the Custodes (not without getting some for themselves), save for [[Lhaeriel Ray]], who was about to be slain by the Captain General save for the intervention of Grandmaster of Assassins [[Drakan Vangorich]] and Inquisitor [[Veritus]]. She was then brought to the ultra-secure Inquisition stronghold under the South Pole, to be interrogated and incarcerated for life. There she displayed a token from [[Vulkan]], who had apparently given it to [[Eldrad]] to indicate "friendship" in some future crisis, and continued to reiterate that she came in peace and to send a message to the Emperor, who she said once counted [[Eldrad|the dick]] as a friend. Eventually, though, Inquisitor [[Marguerethe Wienand|Weinand]] helped her escape to a shuttle where she went off to parts unknown, presumably carrying news of the whole affair and the situation on Terra back to [[Ulthwe]].