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stories:kerelians_aliens_and_spaceships

Kerelian

The Kerelians (Anglish: The People) are a race of sentient extraterrestrial humanoids who originate from the lush jungle planet of Kerelia. Other species are known to refer to them as “blues”, “savages”, “the locals”, “hostiles”, “the natives”, or “blue monkeys”. Many have since modernized within Frankish society in the last two centuries, but a significant number of them still cling to their old ways, both on Kerelia and in newly established colonies on the Rims of Francia.


Description

The Kerelians are, on average, approximately 3 meters (~ 10 feet) tall, with smooth, striped cyan-colored skin, large amber eyes, and long, sweeping tails. Their bodies are more slender than humans. They were the first known extraterrestrial species discovered to have human-like consciousness and intelligence. Although the Kerelians were a society of hunter-gatherers with technology equivalent of Ventus Terra's Paleolithic epoch, they had developed a sophisticated culture based on a profound spiritual connection to other life on their planet, each other, and an encompassing “spirit” they call Valte.


Physiology

Kerelian skin is smooth, iridescent, and cyan in color accentuated with slightly darker cyan stripes. Their bodies have feline-like features such as long sweeping tails, pointed ears and triangular faces with flat bifurcated noses, all framed with large, almost hypnotically golden eyes. Bioluminescent markings that seem to follow the path of the circulatory or nervous system aid in identification and mood display. The skin color is due to the presence of the cyanin pigment. It can “tan” to a darker purplish color after prolonged sunlight exposure. Despite their cyan skin color, the Kerelians have red blood, utilizing an iron oxygen-transporting compound similar to hemoglobin. However, the Kerelian cell nucleus does not use nucleic acids to encode genetic information. Therefore, their genetic makeup is not considered to be DNA (thus they most likely do not utilize RNA in the synthesis of proteins).

Kerelians have a highly evolved nervous system including a queue which resembles a long, rather ostentatious hair braid. This seemingly conventional braid actually sheathes a remarkably intricate system of neural tendrils that can be connected to similar structures of other life-forms. Interestingly, they are also able to expand this bond without requiring a direct connection, a manner of telepathic connection which is still not understood by the scientific community at large.

The Kerelians appear to have no other body hair, with the exception of eyelashes and a small “bob” of fur on the end of their tails. The tail itself can be moved and controlled like any other appendage and is used primarily for balance. It is frequently used to express emotions as well.

Kerelians have four fingers on each hand including opposable thumbs and four toes on each foot including opposable big toes. The waist is narrow and elongated. The shoulders are very wide, creating a V-shaped upper back. The neck is long and body slender. The musculature sharply defined, giving no sense of emaciation despite thin proportions. Their skeleton is reinforced with naturally occurring carbon fiber. Average male is approximately 3 meters (~ 10 feet) tall; females slightly smaller due possibly to evolutionary “size” dimorphism. Average male has a mass around 162 kg (approximately 356 pounds). In Kerelian gravity (0.8 Ventus Terra g) they weigh 1271.38 N or 286 lb (compared to 1589.22 N or 357 lb in Ventus Terra's gravity). Female mass slightly less due to lighter build and slightly shorter stature.

Dentition is similar to that of Baseline Humans, though the canines are more pronounced. They also have roughly four times the strength of the average Baseline Human. The average Kerelian life span is longer than that of a Baseline Human – approximately 30% longer – though they mature more rapidly.

Reproduction mechanics (e.g. physical coupling) are similar to humans and other Terran mammals. However, it should be noted that although female Kerelians have breasts similar to those on female Humans – also used to nurse their infants – they are not placental mammals and, as such, the actual internal reproductive biology is quite different from Terran mammals.


Indigenous Culture and Society

The Kerelians are humanoid creatures that once lived in various territorial clans across Kerelia. Though their culture was essentially paleolithic, they had an egalitarian social organization, unusual in a society at such a stage of development. A premium was placed upon young men and women growing up to become exceptional hunters and possibly warriors, as was necessary due to the nature of the Kerelian environment and the level of Kerelian technological advancement.

The Kerelians and other species may have been controlled by the sentient intelligence they worship as Valte. They choose to live in harmony and natural equilibrium with their surroundings. If they became too numerous, Valte may have devised a way to limit their numbers before they cause an ecological imbalance, for she would supposedly maintain the balance of life. Over the millennia, the Kerelians had developed a healthy respect and reverence for their surrounding environment. In return, Valte may have possibly affected the environment to provide them with sufficient food and shelter, creatures to ride for ground transportation, and an ambient, comfortable temperature throughout the different biomes of Kerelia. Oddly, there do not seem to be many harmful or irritating insects and disease organisms, but whether or not this is intentional will require further research.

The Kerelians had failed to develop tools and weapons for purposes beyond possible primitive warfare with the surrounding clans and hunting/survival, an anomaly stemming perhaps from the fertility of the planet. For a race that was so connected to all other creatures, warfare would seem unlikely, but not unheard of, as indicated by numerous references to the term “warrior”. If there is inter-clan conflict, it is a rare exception to the rule. They did, however, have a rich handicraft tradition and engage in extensive body decoration signifying both rank, activity, and individual tastes. With the caution that it is perhaps spurious to make cross cultural comparisons across star systems, the Kerelians were comparable to now extinct pre-bronze age hunter-gatherer societies that formed in some pre-colonial African, American aboriginal, and Australian indigenous tribes with trace similarities to the Norse culture of northern Europe. Lacking any tradition of formal science as inhabitants of Ventus Terra know it, they experience Valte as an all-knowing, all-powerful entity, and have possibly developed a complex animistic religion based upon their interactions with Eywa, and centered around the Arborescence des Âmes and the Arborescence des Voix, two of many sacred spiritual locations found across Kerelia that provide access to the Kerelian neural network.


Modern Culture and Society

In order to maintain a population balance, following contact and the establishment of peaceful relations between the Terran Alliance and several Kerelian Tribes, such as the Anurai, maybe began assimilating into Human Culture and established settlements on other worlds within Alliance space, in many cases where Human efforts were not expended or planets deemed too dangerous for corporate colonization efforts. Once the Kerelian Exodus began, in order to maintain their population balance on Kerelia with their native environment, the native's began sending those individuals away they deemed not fit to survive in the environment present on their home world, often into the Terran Alliance's “Merriam Program” which sought to uplift what it saw as a backwards savage race. Many faced discrimination at the hands of their Human Teachers, though they did manage to become as one would say, “uplifted from their barbarity”. This process continues to this very day, though the rampant discrimination that was found under the Terran Alliance is nearly non-existent under the Frankish Empire's direction.

Kerelians living in urban society as we see it are no different from Baseline Humans in their beliefs or how they view society, having been separate for such a period of time from their native environment that many no longer understand the significance of their queue beyond mating with another Kerelian.

stories/kerelians_aliens_and_spaceships.txt · Last modified: 2019/03/29 15:14 by 127.0.0.1

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