Lore:Ethereals
 Ethereal |
Denonyms: Ethereal, Ethereals |
Ethereals
Rising out the scenic and lethal vistas of their homeworld Where All Is Found, Ethereals came into existence as one of the most truly 'alien' lifeforms in the Orion Spur. The environment of their homeworld was destined to be an extreme one, energy storms and harsh, extreme temperatures pumping enough energy into the planet itself to create extreme tectonic activity. However, these conditions would create species that would survive it.
Rather than developing to be hunter-gatherers like other races, or as agriculturalists, Ethereals developed in a beautifully lethal tropical biosphere-- one that runs on electricity. Naturally occurring photovoltaic crystals grow alongside plants that reciprocate charge through airborne static, collected on the wind by seemingly impossible creatures with highly-conductive horns. Small floating fairy-like creatures almost like sentient ball lightning gather in the most electrically-active lands around the equator, with millions of strikes a year. Luminescent grasses, each a tiny electrochemical cell, derive their energy out of falling fruits from up high. Only the smallest numbers of predators exist in their ecology, creatures that directly drain electricity.
However, the most impressive organism Where All Is Found are the 'Worldtrees;' monumental floral growths reaching into the stratosphere that serve dual purpose as biobatteries and generators, thought to be what supports and creates the strange sights of their planet. From these Worldtrees, the most intelligent creatures on the planet grow as fruit; Ethereals, creatures which evolved to become humanoid, intelligent and emotional to survive their environment as one. Every so often an Ethereal core will drop from a 'Worldtree' like a fruit, and rolling to a chamber underneath to develop into their true forms.
Fleshy creatures with glassy, translucent skin, luminescent blood, and crystalline organs and bones, there is much that Ethereals are capable of. Retreating into voltaic chrysalides to regenerate their bodies or even change their shapes, tuning their electric fields to play songs akin to a theremin, and living for hundreds of years uninterrupted-- but rather than as traders or warriors, Ethereals live as the shepherds and caretakers Where All Is Found.
Some run with the nomadic animals of their homeworld to guide them around its harsh geology, others enrich each other by singing and sharing energy and playing under the light of the star they orbit-- and a few choose to undertake the task of living underneath the Worldtrees themselves, taking care of every new soul that passes into the world, not seeing life and death but only the flow of energy from one place to another. Besides those that live in hand-built settlements in fallen, dead branches, or simply those that run elsewhere through the wilds Where All Is Found, most Ethereal homes are built in the canopies of their birthplace trees.
Without the brand-new, blank-slate cores that grow from their Worldtrees, Ethereals naturally reproduce by fission. One splitting into two, the two carrying on some of the characteristics of the original. Entire lineages and settlements have grown from the roots of one act of crystalline mitosis, often resulting in soft 'castes' of Ethereals that all share the same preferences in activities, with traces of skills that they never remembered actively learning. Products of fission share the one thing that Ethereals cannot change; their color, the glow of their innards shining through their bodies.
Developing without war and conflict, and hardly knowing any pressure from other lifeforms Where All Is Found, Ethereals developed into a culture without large, overarching 'drives.' Lacking in a will to power, and lacking in any need to spread across their homeworld or conquer new lands, their way of life became isolationist, yet not tribal. Disparate, communal, but aimless. Ethereals across Where All Is Found are bound by one common principle, a proverb passed down countless ages-- 'If harmony is where all is found, we will prosper.' Variations on the idea exist in different places across their planet, but they all carry the same ethos- to promote cooperation and amity, even across cultures spanning over whole continents. So their peoples would be, and they would remain in undirected peace until the day of human contact...
What's in a name?
Ethereals take a three-part name, unifying influences of their self, their physical reality, and their spiritual reality, taking the form: Name + Color-Concept.
Name: The most self-driven aspect of the name, this takes the generic form of a conventional first name. Sociologists have identified common trends amonst socialized Ethereals, wherein their name stems loosely either from ancient root names, or ones with Gaelic origins, though the statistical rigor of these trend-findings has been consistently... sub-par.
Color: The biological constraint. Ethereals will, when exposed to their first language, gravitate towards a singular shade or hue similar to their own base glow. The specific word depends more on the Ethereal's disposition than precisely matching their hue. In a double-blind study with spectrometers, two Ethereals were found to emanate the same wavelength of blue; despite this, one identified as Turqoise, and the other Indigo. Both parties consistently identified short zoomed videos of their skin as belonging to the correct person, despite a quantifiable 0.03% difference in footage.
Concept: The spiritual constraint. Similar to their fixation on a specific word for a similar hue, as an Ethereal explores and is exposed to broader and more diverse ideas, they will eventually settle on the word of a concept to take as their third name. This can be as deep as an intrinsic emotional connection to the concept, or as trite as the word having a good "mouth-feel" to the person. In healthy Ethereals, their worldview is rarely unchallenged and this name tends to remain theirs for their entire natural life. Trauma and other philosophical threats have been known to disturb an Ethereal enough that it adopts a different concept, and as a result the Ethereal glows just a bit dimmer than before.
Examples of recorded Ethereal names: Habel Vermillion-Sunset. Lysandria Fuchsia-Harmony. Cherry Red-Sucker.
When an Ethereal undergoes fission, becoming two new persons, they both take new names. As they both retain the original person's color, the two new Ethereals typically identify as the same named Color, and while their chosen Name and fixated Concept will vary, closely-connected twins often find that their names rhyme or share some other subtle connection.
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, |
