User:GreytideSkye/Vox
 Vox |
Denonyms: Vox |
This Species
Vox, one of the least understood species in the Nova Sector, appear to come in some form of organic-technology mech suit, piloted by an organically-grown brain they call a "stack." One will find Vox aboard Arkships, each dedicated to researching some perceived exploit in reality. Plasma duplication, xenobiology, farming, bluespace... you name it, there's an Arkship studying it.
To what end is such a commonplace fact known by every Vox, that no Vox will dare translate the Navigator's mission into a lesser tongue, lest the translation collapse an infomatic quantum noospheric state and render the past centuries of research retrocasually inert. No, nobody in Nanotrasen knows what that means, and no, no Vox will elaborate further.
Regardless, Vox can be found anywhere civilization is, following the compulsions of their Arkship of origin. If their actions seem unscientific to you, you simply lack the neural pathways to conceive of the true hypothesis being tested.
"Vox" and "Vox Primalis" are the exact same species, differentiated because of coding concerns. Lorewise, they are the same.
Analysis: Biological
Physiology, Origins
From the desk of the Historical Derevisionism Fact Checking Team:
Cross-reference: Early parables, Speculative Evolution research, Bluespace Retroobservatory 7's findings on the Vox Origins.
Conclusions, disputed:
- Early Vox were avian in nature, the result of several bird-like species analogous to Sol's Corvids evolving towards first intelligence, and then fine manipulation.
- Early Vox were reptilian, ground-based feathered or unfeathered quadrupeds who evolved bipedalism along traditional evolutionary pathways. Tailed initially, possibly lost during upright walking, reintroduced for productivity upon fleshsculpters' discovery of deprecated neural pathways. Research tends to agree subconclusively on this evolutionary track.
- Early Vox were paradoxically modern Vox, cast back through future work from the Transtemporal Team, which eventually will always have been the strongest path to the Vision.
Analysis: The mythological plausibilities of multiple competing origins serve the Vision greater than firmly cementing a single pathway into mundane fact.
Relatable Sol Meme, for optimal cognitive connections: "If I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice."
Physiology, Modern
Sol Federation's Threat Analysis Bureau has this to say:
The average Vox is a digitigrade, reptilian biped with stiff, semi-rigid keratin quills on their head, a long prehensile tail, and a teethed and bilaterally-split jaw. They have a flexible and lightweight skeleton and a two-channel redundant nervous system. They generally stand anywhere from 1.3 to 2 meters tall, averaging at 1.5 for most Vox, with a primarily green and brown coloration, but can have different colored quills and body markings. Their bodies are scaled with rigid, nonconducting plates in overlapping rows, which can be bristled or flattened at will to optimize cooling or form interior seals as to retain heat. Their aforementioned quills act as a supplementary cooling system, with tiny capillaries allowing bloodflow into the hollow recesses inside of the quills, which they may often violently shake to produce a cooling effect with the air; this also functions as a threat display, as many Vox will attempt to cool themselves down before engaging in a fight as to regulate their body-temperature though exertion. They do not respirate as humans do, but they do require a nitrogen-rich atmosphere to 'breathe', and suffer badly in the presence of oxygen. Their musculature is geared towards sudden bursts of rapid movement, with a vulnerability to lactic acid buildup as a result.
Biopsies of discarded voxform have confirmed analogous brain features to most biological life, though the outstretched nerves are coated in a more active protein, more easily damaged than the standard myelin sheath, but organically repaired through their dual-focus immune system. From that, what were previously seen as mismatched colorations on the voxform scales have been postulated to instead be their equivalent of a scar: discarded tissue repurposed elsewhere in the body by their immunorepair system. Blood clotting in particular seems to be mismatched tissue organically welded into place, in contrast to a dedicated platelet structure. As a net result, the common voxform does not replenish its supply of repair tissue, relying on external supplements and an inefficient conversion of amino acids. Voxform thus seem to be intentionally designed to age and degrade; interrogations have yielded conflicting theories, including references to a "Mortality Appreciation inquest," a means to enforce returning to the Arkship for debriefing and updates, and a retrocausal conspiracy that implies that future voxform actively steal components from present voxform. They have remained uniformly silent about a suspicious cavity near the brain stem found in all known autopsies.
To future medical teams, while the first Vox we have found were weird inside, more recently, Voxform have been coming as more analogous to human-standard surgical diagrams. Between your standard training with Genemodders and other xenobiological surgery, you should be able to repair a damaged Vox without significantly esoteric experience.
Each Voxform has been found with artificial markings upon their body, in seemingly no uniform pattern or symmetry. We've ruled out biological lineage and social caste; several genetically identical Voxform have been found with wildly different markings, and one set was found to be multi-layered, stacking six layers of conflicting symbology atop each other. We lack a statisticically significant sample size of complaint individuals with which to draw further conclusions. In short:
fuck if we know.Additional funding is required to resolve these mysteries.
{{VoxNote}} The Vox markings culturally exist to identify a Vox's topic of research, their present skillsets, their past accomplishments, and active experiments. Of particular note are the Voxform's position in the Tree, and any possible Publications they have notably Contributed to. Alas, there is no standardized format or verification of these markings, as the Individuality Team found greater detriment to mass standardization than the Qualiolinguistics Transferrence Team found benefit.
{{VoxNote}} Each Vox is the mind, memories, and skills encapsulated in a comparatively small biomechanical organ, the Cortical Stack. The Cortical Stack is transplanted between different Voxforms as death or need of differing Voxforms occur. The Cortical Stack holds the Resonance of the Vox, as well as critical memories crucial to that Vox's sense of self and ability to contribute. The Voxform's brain holds the specific motor skills unique to that Voxform, as well as basic cultural knowledge and task analysis. As a result, modern Vox may literally have more progressive views than Vox remaining in older Voxforms. The Cortical Stack was intentionally designed to internally cannibalize a Voxform upon the body's death, sustaining the core Vox self through intensely dire situations and over extended durations, similar to how a human's gut biome will digest itself posthumously.
Analysis: Cultural
Culture, Origins
All Vox culture is derived from a single tenet, the Grand Vision:
todo: Research brings power.
From this axiom comes the rest of their civilization.
Culture, Present Organization
Teams
Vox have twelve words for these research groups, discerning size, intent, likelihood of being on the critical path to the end of Science, and notoriety, but the Universal Linguistics Information Redundancy Team strongly suggests that each research group be referred to in other languages strictly as a Team. More prominent teams include the Diplomacy Team, Violence Team, Productivity Team (mockingly known as the Team Team), Materials Team (notably split along the Organics, Inorganics, and Applied Materials Teams), and Immaterials Team. Almost every lesser Team can trace their way up the Tree (the data structure) to one of these teams, almost as much a historical record as an organizational chart (Tree is a anachronistic term, as many Teams are derived from close collaboration between two distinct teams. For formality, each Vox still can trace their way to a single top-level Arkship, often reflecting their individual interest's route to their current Team as opposed to the Team itself having a path. When referring to the Team as a whole's place in the tree, the Team's Pilot's position is used). An individual Vox belongs to only one team at any given moment in their life, though are often commissioned by other teams to conduct parallel research as they pursue their main vision. Example: the Carp Killing Team is often responsible for great strides with the Carp Scale Collection Team.
Arkships
Vox are organized into Arkships, massive interstellar vessels dedicated to a research topic, with the largest easily dwarfing most planets. A mixture of inorganic and organic technologies, these ships grow with effort and necessity, absorbing flesh and metal in equal measures into their superstructures. Each Arkship's research topic, or Vision, tends to be as broad as the ship is large, with obvious exceptions for research into size-related matters. The Diplomacy Team serves aboard the largest known Arkship, whose name is incomprehensibly long, oft shortened to todo: "The Tongues". When one Vox refers to the Arkships, they typically mean the most prominent ones, though any vessel which hosts Vox and a focused mission qualifies. Arkships are known to host specific inquiries and research fields as todo: subsets of the primary Vision. This Arkship organization is a result of early Productivity Team inquests with the Immaterials' Data Transfer and Storage research, finding an optimum between research mobility, data locality, and cross-research applications. Modern Productivity Team findings, especially in a post-Bluespace era, would not reach the same conclusions, but the Cultural Monolith Team and Repurposement Initiative separately concluded that disassembling the Arkships for decentralized research stations would be both cruel, inefficient, and culturally suppressive.
Ships and vessels not directly serving a Vision are known as Skipjacks. These are much more disposable, often sourced directly from other cultures through "transactions" with the Diplomacy or Violence teams.
Publications
Vox have two forms of publication. The Advancement, which details a successful product, ranging from an improved sorting algorithm to a universal bluespace drive. Advancements that progress Voxkind to their ultimate goal are the most desired, but Successologists bicker about what that specifically means. While these concrete advancements and proofs of successful research are the most prestigious conclusions a research inquiry can come to, even tales of failure have their part in the grand plan.
On the other side of the coin, there are the documentations of experiments, methodologies, intents and approaches. The Parable. Salvaged into a cohesive narrative, these parables instead teach a lesson. The more widely applicable the lesson, the greater the parable, but even lessons as narrow as "don't press two elevator buttons at once on the X5 Turbolift on Skipjack C-137" are published to some honor. The most universal Parables are sometimes distilled to just their conclusions and referred to as Laws. Even the most universal laws are still to be questioned and applied situationally, in service of the grand Vision.
The Extrinsic Motivation team birthed the Crypt team through the developed urge to be recognized as having contributed to the greater Vision.
If a research paper has a related works section, so too an Arkship has a mausoleum. When the Arkship succeeds, and reality belongs to the Vox, so too will they be vindicated.
Notable Laws
From the desk of the Linear Time Conservation team:
The Law of Deference
Observation: Linear time is a non-fungible resource. Decisions require time. Explanations require time.
Result: There may not be time to explain why what must be done, must be done.
Proposal:
Invocation: The Law Of Deference.
Procedure: Briefly analyze the relevant experience of the speaker. Common signs include job title, age, renown, attachment to relevant publications. Summary: Are they credible?
Procedure: Briefly analyze the implied concern. Is time a limited concern? Common signs include vocal inflection, visible environmental concerns (fire, air, medical state), phrases akin to "There's no time to explain!"
Analysis: If the request is found to be suitably urgent, and the requestor speaks with the authority of one who Knows Better than you, comply.
Post-procedure: Correctly log the resulting actions as Deferred actions. Your personal credibility will be adjusted solely on your analysis of the credibility and urgency, and your performance of the deferred action; the physical actions and results reflect upon the speaker's reputation. You have a right to a mention in the Deferred Actors sub-appendix of any resulting publication.
From the desk of the Cross-Cultural Communication Optimization team:
"The Law of Deference is how a Vox decides when to question an order, and when to obey it. This may be a subsconscious reflex in your personal culture. You may find parallels with 'lawful orders', 'leadership', and 'panic reflex'. "
TODO: Properly flesh out.
Law of Perspective: tl;dr other viewpoints exist, recognize your limited view and considers others' earnestly, factoring in their intent and credibility
Law of Compassion: tl;dr see a vox, help a vox. Stems from Law of Perspective; preserve others' perspective and ensure as many honest perspectives exist as is sustainable. Side note from Immaterials + Diplomacy Team: be compassionate to nonvox, as goodwill is a valued resource.
Titles
While every Vox has a Team, a Vision they serve, and a biological form, the Lossy Information Compression Team has correlated Vox into generic groups, or 'castes', based on their immediate function to their surroundings. The titles alone do not confer any social standing, only knowledge and credibility do, and a Vox may find themselves changing castes routinely as their research takes them to different environments and their skillsets evolve.
- Apex: In charge of, or the most knowledgeable about large research topics. These rare few Vox have transcended the limitations of the standard Voxform biomechanistry, oft sacrificing their resleevability to achieve greater cognitive expansion to track and process further research. Easily confusable with an organic supercomputer.
- Auralis: Knowledgeable about a number of research topics, often the generally-smartest Vox in a room. These Vox are either not yet learned enough to ascend to Apexhood, or believe they still require typical voxform to best serve the Vision. The Cultural Mythos Team projects the Auralis as taller than other Vox, identifiable from across the room, and often twice as loud.
- Drone: The Engineers, technicians, and builders of Vox society, focused on Inorganic interactions. Their voxform are adapted to apply physical alterations to their surroundings, with varying degrees of dexterity and raw strength. A Drone tends to become specialized for their local environment or task.
- Servitor: Drones with a specialty in organic affairs. Duties often overlap with common Drones, given the biomechanical nature of their technology. Also likely to specialize for their environment or task, a Servitor may equally be found restocking cabinets, preparing meals, or surgically exploring a corpse.
- Raiders: Vox designed to be highly reactive to uncertain circumstances. Historically, this caste has been strictly combat-oriented, but as more sapient life is discovered and the Diplomacy Team becomes a greater need for the Vision, this has grown to include most outward-facing Vox positions. A conversation is just as fast-paced and nuanced as a firefight, after all. Due to the Cultural Stigma Team's findings, some Vox who may technically fulfill the role of a Raider may instead be referred to by a less stigmatized caste, often Drone or Servitor.
- Scavengers: Vox designed to reduce and repurpose uncertain circumstances into known quantities and usable materials. Historically, this has been limited to deconstructing wreckage and corpse alike, working in the aftermath of a Raider imposition, but now the caste reflects any uncertain resource gathering role. Traders, gossipers, spies, trophy spouses.
- Larva: 'Larva' are not Vox children, as they'd be less than a few months old at youngest, but a denigrating term for Vox that either have not yet been assigned a duty, or those currently in-between them. While these Vox are often pushed by their peers to 'hurry up already,' it is the wide consensus of Vox that 'A lone Apex is worse than a larva, for while even a larva has a future, all the Apex has is obsolete grudges.'
In addition to the castes, a Vox may also be referred to as a Pilot. Rather than steering a physical ship, a Pilot is simply the leader of a specific research inquiry. Apex and Auralis are Pilots of grand inquests, but even a Drone in a mine may be piloting a small-scale geological survey. The Pilot is the first name on a research publication, and the one who ultimately carries that research's Vision through to the end.
In-Game Lore Blurb
this is what's rn in-game in the species blurb.
Designed and grown by the Apex, biocomputers the size of massive willow trees, the average Vox is a digitigrade, reptilian biped with stiff, semi-rigid keratin quills on their head, a long prehensile tail, and a teethed and bilaterally-split jaw. They have a flexible and lightweight skeleton and a two-channel redundant nervous system. They generally stand anywhere from 1.3 to 2 meters tall, averaging at 1.5 for most Vox, taller for Armalis, with a primarily green and brown coloration, but can have different colored quills and body markings. Their bodies are scaled with rigid, nonconducting plates in overlapping rows, which can be bristled or flattened at will to optimize cooling or form interior seals as to retain heat. Their aforementioned quills act as a supplementary cooling system, with tiny capillaries allowing bloodflow into the hollow recesses inside of the quills, which they may often violently shake to produce a cooling effect with the air; this also functions as a threat display, as many Vox will attempt to cool themselves down before engaging in a fight as to regulate their body-temperature though exertion. They do not respirate as humans do, but they do require a nitrogen-rich atmosphere to 'breathe', and suffer badly in the presence of oxygen. Their musculature is geared towards sudden bursts of rapid movement, with a vulnerability to lactic acid buildup as a result.
While the brain of any sort of Vox up to the Auralis are certainly present, a Vox is not considered 'alive' without the Cortical Stack. This mechanical brain is installed the minute a Vox is produced by the Apex, mind uploading being one of the oldest disciplines of the Vox, and it holds their memories, personality, and body information. These machines also hold their genetic information, a newly 'resleeved' Vox physically mutating into the parameters set by their stack. A Vox is not considered 'dead' as long as their stack can be put in a new body, and this process affords them functional immortality. However, no other beings are considered 'alive' either due to their lack of one; their absence of the divine spark of the Auralis. They feel neither empathy nor hatred towards aliens, their short, violent and ephemeral existences ultimately meaning as little as furniture to the Vox.
Artificially made by the Apex, Vox Primalis are grown for a purpose, their personalities and duties sourced by the cortical stacks installed in their heads. The exact specifications and duties of a Primalis may change throughout their life according to the enigmatic will of the biocomputers fabricating them, and their duties may be oddly specific at times; but seven core 'groups' of jobs are known by humans, signified by a series of neck, throat, facial, and back markings encoded with their role, genetic lineage, notable deeds, and arkship of origin.
'Drones' are the engineers, technicians, and builders of the Primalis. Their duties revolve around the upkeep of the Arkships themselves, and the operation of technologies new and old. 'Servitors' are in charge of biological affairs; making sure stocks are full, meals are made, and Vox are healthy. They typically share work with Drones due to Vox technology being both synthetic and organic.
'Raiders' are those combat-focused Primalis sent on excursion teams from the ships to plunder goods, people, and other wares from aliens. 'Scavengers' work alongside Raiders, pulling stations and ships apart to find anything even remotely valuable, down to the scrap metal and copper wiring in an outpost.
'Reavers' are essentially the white blood cells of an Arkship. Rarely seen but always around, these Vox are dedicated to expunging threats and ensuring that individuals in need of 'pruning' are brought in swiftly to the Armalis and Apex. If ever seen outside an Arkship, it's typically for the purpose of overseeing other Primalis in place of a proper Armalis.
'Leaders' are those that are in charge of a crew. Acting like a tightly-knit family, these work crews are kept in line not only by the Armalis, but by these typically very old Vox. These magnanimous (for a Primalis) individuals are very, very rarely seen outside of an Arkship due to their assignments requiring 'active duty'. To see a 'Leader,' in a place of aliens is to know that they are almost assuredly an exile, and shunned by all varieties of Vox. The Vox consider 'drains on resources' as inexcusable, and to be one is an act to be shunned upon.
'Larva' are not Primalis children, as they'd be less than a few months old at youngest, but a denigrating term for Vox that either have not yet been assigned a duty, or those currently inbetween them. While these Vox are often pushed by other Primalis to 'hurry up already,' it is the wide consensus of Vox that 'A lone leader is worse than a larva, for while even a larva has a future, all the leader has is a disgraced past.'
Work in Progress: Footer subject to change at a moment's notice. Do not take a red link's presence, struck-through or otherwise, as confirmation (or denial) of their canonicity.
| Nova Sector Lore
| |
| Common Species | Humans, Tiziran, Unathi, Moths, Ethereals, Azulae, Slime Hybrids, Teshari, Synthetic Humanoids (and assorted robots), Pod Persons |
| Other Species | Genemodders (Felinids, Ice Walkers, Dwarf), Ashwalkers, Hemophages, Snailpersons, Ordoht (Formerly Skrell), Plasmamen, Flypeople, Vox (Primalis et al), Tajaran, Vulpkanin, Xenomorphic Hybrid, Rouges (Abductorkin), Miscellaneous Species |
| Nanotrasen | Nanotrasen, Central Command, Emergency Response Corps |
| External Groups | The Syndicate, Interdyne Pharmaceutics, DS-2, Cargo, The Spider Clan |
| Nova | The Nova Sector, Indecipheres, Freyja |
| Concepts | Bluespace, Plasma, Faster Than Light Travel, Resonance ("Souls"), Death |
| SolFed | SolFed, Earth in 2565, |
