Concept for a species

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Years ago, their planet was becoming uninhabitable (think on a planet-wide Chernobyl scale). So they sent their people out into the galaxy, always planning to return when the planet was naturally restored. No matter which planet they travel to, they are not to think of it as home - only their ancestral planet is that.

Before they left, they encoded the sum of the entire planet's knowledge into their DNA (somehow - naturally or artificially) so that they could all have access to their planet's info wherever they went, and preserve and share it with others. In addition, they would add whatever new info they had collected on their travels to their collective knowledge.

Every day, or before a dangerous mission, they would leave a sample of their blood with their knowledge inside behind as a backup in the event of their death, with instructions that it be given to another of their species, or returned to the planet when it's livable again.

Members of this species are essentially a living library of their planet and people, which they can access when necessary.

I imagine a Starfleet crew member of the species, who may have a real name, but is called "Atlas" because he/she bears the weight of a world on his/her shoulders. I also imagine them having a child with a fellow crewmember and naming her "Alexandria" (after the library).

 

[admiralelm11]

Fascinating…

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

All sorts of interesting plots could develop - meeting another of their kind and having to take on their unique memories when they die - processing another's emotions, Borg comparisons, living computer that is not an android - taking their mortality seriously, learning of a possible way to fix their homeworld earlier (that ultimately won't work), creating a holodeck version of the world, and so on.

 

[Will The Serious]

processing another's emotions, Borg comparisons

Perhaps, their conscious and/or unconscious experiences rewrite and update their genetic codes continuously. Their children inherite their memories up to the time of their conception, such that their offspring can remember generations of past lives. They, as you stated, have a method, a mental or physical method of memory transference, as well. This would enable them to share memories that were created in their later years.

Would they also have no need for a traditional vocal language? Maybe their memories would replace communication. Lying would be impossible, unless they could pick and choose which memories to transfer; maybe even create false memories.

processing another's emotions, Borg comparisons, living computer that is not an android

What would it mean to the Borg to assimilate a member of a species that held, and was genetically encoded with, the memories of generations of an entire culture. Maybe these memories and the species natural ability to share them with others could actually present a threat to the Borg. They could act as a sort of identity virus that replicates itself within the Borg memory. The Borg tries to assimilate them, but, through a powerful natural memory rewriting process, the Borg get assimilated, instead.

-Will

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Would they also have no need for a traditional vocal language? Maybe their memories would replace communication. Lying would be impossible, unless they could pick and choose which memories to transfer; maybe even create false memories.

I imagine they would value it because they're very sensory; the experience of vocalizing something stimulates their mind in a different way than direct blood-borne transmission would.

They have a concept of a "blood library".

 

[Robert Bruce Scott]

Sweet critter design. Shades of Frank S. Herbert's DUNE and the Bene Gesseret, who can look into their cellular memory and access every memory of every female ancestor up to the point of conception of the next ancestor.

Thanks!! rbs

 

[admiralelm11]

I once created a species using Yoda’s species from Star Wars for Trek. No one liked the Horrusi.

 

[Bynar0110]

I created a humanoid bird like species for the fic i'm writing.

 

[Will The Serious]

I have been thinking about an intelligent and mobile plant species. They would need sunlight.

There are two species designs unique to my own stories. The Octilians are a reptilian species that look like a land dwelling octopus, and the H'Popattapi are the dominant species of Ken'tsen, also known as Epsilon-Hydra VII.

-Will

 

[Robert Bruce Scott]

I created the foozies long before I started writing Star Trek fan fiction. But I went ahead and drafted them into the Star Beagle Adventures:

“They’re kind of like squoushy medicine balls, about 5 foot in diameter.... the paradise that was Fender Marsh was of their making.”

“How could they make anything if they had no arms? No hands? Not even eyes?”

“They had a hundred mouths. They would swallow seeds and germinate them, selecting them for specific traits. They would swallow fish eggs, amphibian eggs, insect eggs, and select them for specific traits. They weren’t just farming. The were transforming the biosphere...They communicated biochemically, not just by pheromones, but even by the plants and animals they chose to nurture instead of digest..."

 

[Will The Serious]

Thinking about it, I have a third species design. His name is Tutu. He looks very much like a black lion humanoid with a wild golden haired mane. I don't know what he is, but his species have been spacefarers for over a thousand years and they are from the outer tip of the Perseus arm of the Milky Way.

Maybe it would be a good idea to start a xenopedia of non-cannon species introduced by fan fiction.

-Will

 

[Robert Bruce Scott]

Critters from the Star Trek Hunter / Star Beagle Adventures Trekverse (this is a very abbreviated list - a comprehensive list would take a few pages):

Foozies - (described above)

Boreans - a species similar in appearance to Neanderthals who created an AI that reduced their culture to a very primitive level

Serrati - Silicon based lifeform that is highly telepathic but avoids contact with carbon based life because their telepathic contact is very dangerous to carbon based life

Tongue-fish - large, whale-like, water breathing creatures that feed by beaching and licking animals off the beach with very long, prehensile tongues.

Wrappers - a carnivorous plant that wraps venomn-spiked fronds around the legs of passing animals

Shadowhounds - A wild, pack carnivore with long, whip-like antennae that lay back across their bodies and multi-colored fur that turns to provide flowing camouflage. Domesticated and used by Andorians for search and retrieval operations.

Sporthogs - large, boar-like, highly intelligent omnivores domesticated by the trill and used for controlling crowds and tracking and hunting fugitives.

Giant Waterbirds - pterosaur-like flying animals. Highly intelligent and capable of learning several languages, they are natural poets and tend to sing in large choirs in the evenings, inventing new poetry for each song.

Nikimsitiri - highly intelligent crow-like animals - about 2-4 times the size of an average crow. Also capable of learning several languages. They make superb fighters, police and farmers.

Tetrasquids - Intelligent squid-like animals that produce multi-colored ink inside their bodies and excel at 4-dimentioinal wave painting.

Beholders - actually two symbiotic species - an animal sort of like a jellyfish, inside which live intelligent mushrooms capable of taking over a computer or a living brain and can move long distances through subspace. The two creatures together might appear as a floating eyeball with the jellyfish-like animal forming the eye and the mushroom as a brain.

Mogu Mogo - large snakelike animals with stingers that burrow into large animals to deposit their larvae - who escape after a two-month gestation period by bursting out of the mouth. For the first 6-hours, the juvenile snakes have wings and fly for miles before shedding their wings. They prefer hot, desert environments.