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feotakahariJust something I felt like putting together.
Parasites: the shadow that devours worlds. No one, not even the Parasites themselves, knows where they keep their true forms. They seem to dwell within the ground, each expanding its dominion over all life on an entire planet. Even if the planet’s surface is bombed into glass, the Parasite will remain, waiting to possess the next fool who lands there.
Parasites have the ability to control the minds of most species, rendering them into little more than parts of the Parasite itself. What they can’t assimilate, they eradicate, and so they wage endless war against the few races they can’t control, like Nomads and Builders. They’ve been known to capture Tinkers alive where possible, so as to rip out their cybernetics and rebuild them as mindless drones.
Parasites have a variety of alarming abilities that no other race can understand or duplicate. Their drones can travel faster than light, without using hyperspace or the Tinkers’ “linkage” technology. They can communicate to their drones, and spread their infection, near-instantaneously across vast reaches of space. They can remold the bodies of their drones into bizarre forms, from venomous warriors to hollow-boned flying scouts to suicide bombers. And above all, they can survive, seemingly without any kind of food, for thousands of years. The only thing that confirms they’re living beings is their desire to reproduce across new worlds.
While rare, it’s possible for a Parasite to defect from the war. They tend to their own world in peace, and may even attempt to trade with other races. But few would ever trust them, if only for their sheer power.
There is no singular Parasite appearance, as their drones take inspiration from the many species they’ve enslaved. However, the neutral Parasite drones near Scrapyard Station appear as ambulatory plants.
Nomads: obligate carnivores that can naturally move through hyperspace. On their old world, they used this both to ambush prey and to hide from much bigger, scarier predators. As soon as they invented space travel, they spread far and wide to less predator-filled worlds, and now they occupy more colonies than any of the other allied races. It was on one such expedition that they encountered the Parasites . . .
Evolution in a predator-filled hellhole has left the Nomads cautious, and arguably paranoid. Still, the ones who live on the frontier tend to be the bravest of the lot. They’re known for their amazing reflexes and their absolutely terrible stamina.
Nomads are one of the larger races, and move comfortably on two legs or four. Their thin fur (or "floof") comes in a wide variety of colors.
Tinkers: that’s us! Earth fell to Parasite conquest a few generations ago, leaving what used to be called humanity scattered among our colony worlds. It was known that cybernetic brain implants protected against Parasite control, so we embraced all manner of augmentation in search of our revenge. We provide the alliance with a great number of both engineers and warriors.
In many ways, a darkness hangs over the Tinkers. Our endless grudge has cost us most of our interest in art that isn’t patriotic or science that can’t be used to kill the enemy. Still, we retain some degree of creativity and humor, and a seemingly irrepressible urge to romance every intelligent species in the universe.
Military or military-supporting tinkers often wear their cybernetics visibly. Other Tinkers simply look like attractive, physically fit humans. Rare “traditionalists” don’t or can’t use enhancements, but they’re looked down on by the enhanced, and tend to cluster in their own communities.
Builders: natural telekinetics with a very limited range. Every Builder is instinctively aware of exactly how far they can reach and how much force they can exert, and this leads to a general knowledge of distance, weight, and angles. Builder architecture and sculpture are legendary.
It’s common to think of Builders as “stupid.” They take a while to come to firm conclusions, and they struggle with philosophy and the more abstract sciences. But just because they think slowly doesn’t mean they think falsehoods, and those who try to trick them will regret it in due time.
Builders are squat, round bipeds with armored plating on their backs. Their telekinesis isn’t very calorie-efficient, so they’re built to store a lot of fat for later usage.
Scholars: the youngest of the spacefarers, Scholars began as tiny worm-like creatures with a telepathic link. They could steal the memories of any creature they ate, and share those memories with the other worms around them. Then one swarm ate a human—or from their perspective, one human suddenly awakened and realized she was now a swarm of worms. She buzzed her new bodies to make speaking sounds, and she communicated her identity to the other humans. With some conflict and controversy, they accepted her as one of their own.
Scholars aren’t much use physically, since each body is about the size of a human thumb. However, their unparalleled memory suits them well as historians and researchers. People who wish to contribute to the furtherance of knowledge have been known to offer themselves up to the Scholars after death, that their minds may keep studying after their bodies have gone.
All the rest: there are plenty of sapient races out there. Gasbags, reptilians, even the odd aquatic species. But most of them aren’t facing population or ecological pressures, and almost all of them have no resistance to Parasite control. Only a handful of them ever leave the safety of their well-guarded home planets, seeking knowledge or glory or escape. Most of those gather at Scrapyard, a multi-species station that has habitation to fit most needs.
Parasites: the shadow that devours worlds. No one, not even the Parasites themselves, knows where they keep their true forms. They seem to dwell within the ground, each expanding its dominion over all life on an entire planet. Even if the planet’s surface is bombed into glass, the Parasite will remain, waiting to possess the next fool who lands there.
Parasites have the ability to control the minds of most species, rendering them into little more than parts of the Parasite itself. What they can’t assimilate, they eradicate, and so they wage endless war against the few races they can’t control, like Nomads and Builders. They’ve been known to capture Tinkers alive where possible, so as to rip out their cybernetics and rebuild them as mindless drones.
Parasites have a variety of alarming abilities that no other race can understand or duplicate. Their drones can travel faster than light, without using hyperspace or the Tinkers’ “linkage” technology. They can communicate to their drones, and spread their infection, near-instantaneously across vast reaches of space. They can remold the bodies of their drones into bizarre forms, from venomous warriors to hollow-boned flying scouts to suicide bombers. And above all, they can survive, seemingly without any kind of food, for thousands of years. The only thing that confirms they’re living beings is their desire to reproduce across new worlds.
While rare, it’s possible for a Parasite to defect from the war. They tend to their own world in peace, and may even attempt to trade with other races. But few would ever trust them, if only for their sheer power.
There is no singular Parasite appearance, as their drones take inspiration from the many species they’ve enslaved. However, the neutral Parasite drones near Scrapyard Station appear as ambulatory plants.
Nomads: obligate carnivores that can naturally move through hyperspace. On their old world, they used this both to ambush prey and to hide from much bigger, scarier predators. As soon as they invented space travel, they spread far and wide to less predator-filled worlds, and now they occupy more colonies than any of the other allied races. It was on one such expedition that they encountered the Parasites . . .
Evolution in a predator-filled hellhole has left the Nomads cautious, and arguably paranoid. Still, the ones who live on the frontier tend to be the bravest of the lot. They’re known for their amazing reflexes and their absolutely terrible stamina.
Nomads are one of the larger races, and move comfortably on two legs or four. Their thin fur (or "floof") comes in a wide variety of colors.
Tinkers: that’s us! Earth fell to Parasite conquest a few generations ago, leaving what used to be called humanity scattered among our colony worlds. It was known that cybernetic brain implants protected against Parasite control, so we embraced all manner of augmentation in search of our revenge. We provide the alliance with a great number of both engineers and warriors.
In many ways, a darkness hangs over the Tinkers. Our endless grudge has cost us most of our interest in art that isn’t patriotic or science that can’t be used to kill the enemy. Still, we retain some degree of creativity and humor, and a seemingly irrepressible urge to romance every intelligent species in the universe.
Military or military-supporting tinkers often wear their cybernetics visibly. Other Tinkers simply look like attractive, physically fit humans. Rare “traditionalists” don’t or can’t use enhancements, but they’re looked down on by the enhanced, and tend to cluster in their own communities.
Builders: natural telekinetics with a very limited range. Every Builder is instinctively aware of exactly how far they can reach and how much force they can exert, and this leads to a general knowledge of distance, weight, and angles. Builder architecture and sculpture are legendary.
It’s common to think of Builders as “stupid.” They take a while to come to firm conclusions, and they struggle with philosophy and the more abstract sciences. But just because they think slowly doesn’t mean they think falsehoods, and those who try to trick them will regret it in due time.
Builders are squat, round bipeds with armored plating on their backs. Their telekinesis isn’t very calorie-efficient, so they’re built to store a lot of fat for later usage.
Scholars: the youngest of the spacefarers, Scholars began as tiny worm-like creatures with a telepathic link. They could steal the memories of any creature they ate, and share those memories with the other worms around them. Then one swarm ate a human—or from their perspective, one human suddenly awakened and realized she was now a swarm of worms. She buzzed her new bodies to make speaking sounds, and she communicated her identity to the other humans. With some conflict and controversy, they accepted her as one of their own.
Scholars aren’t much use physically, since each body is about the size of a human thumb. However, their unparalleled memory suits them well as historians and researchers. People who wish to contribute to the furtherance of knowledge have been known to offer themselves up to the Scholars after death, that their minds may keep studying after their bodies have gone.
All the rest: there are plenty of sapient races out there. Gasbags, reptilians, even the odd aquatic species. But most of them aren’t facing population or ecological pressures, and almost all of them have no resistance to Parasite control. Only a handful of them ever leave the safety of their well-guarded home planets, seeking knowledge or glory or escape. Most of those gather at Scrapyard, a multi-species station that has habitation to fit most needs.
no subject
Date: 2020-02-14 11:18 pm (UTC)Is there a way for them to get these memories without the being dying before or during the process? Or is that just brain-eating horror torture?
--Rogan
no subject
Date: 2020-02-15 12:13 am (UTC)(Sapient scholars no longer eat still-living beings. After all, you wouldn’t want to remember eating yourself. But the wild version was fine with eating wild animals, since those are less complex and therefore less traumatic.)
no subject
Date: 2020-02-15 12:17 am (UTC)D8 FRESH HELL I NEVER CONSIDERED!
no subject
Date: 2020-02-15 12:25 am (UTC)This all adds up to a nickname, one the Scholars themselves tend to resent: “emergency rations.”
no subject
Date: 2020-02-15 12:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-02-15 12:34 am (UTC)--Rogan