Humans
Vital Statistics (At a Glance)
Pronounced ' pronounce here '. Singular is Men or Woman. Possessive is Men's or Woman's. Plural is men, mankind.
- Species Type: Bipedal
- Origin: mostly Evolved, original pattern for the Pelted
- Frame Type: Bipedal, plantigrade
- Average Height:
- Average Lifespan:
- Gravity Preference: Medium
- Homeworld: Terra
- Native Language: Many, English being proto-Universal.
Appearance and Physiology
Physiology
Humanity looks much the same as it does today, with its varied ethnicities and races augmented by the addition of the Lunar and Martian phenotypes (very tall and thin, and shorter but still lighter in build, respectively.
Society
About where humans are, as part of the Alliance.
Stereotypes
In the Alliance, humans consider themselves to be second-class citizens from a world that used to be a starfaring nation of consequence and power, but that has fallen so low it has had to accept its children’s aid just to bootstrap itself back out of the solar system. The Pelted have a complicated relationship with them: no longer fearing or distrusting them, but forced to acknowledge that the gods that made them are flawed creatures, just like anyone else. The Pelted don’t think of humanity as second class citizens, but there is ambivalence there, and every member of the first and second generation Pelted races has to face his or her feelings about interacting with humans. But fortunately for humanity, the Alliance is more than its first and second generation Pelted races. The third generation has no prior relationship with humanity, and the aliens none at all. And that leaves any human participant in this setting with a rich and complex backdrop against which they can live and strive and improve. For human willing to embrace it, the Alliance is the land of opportunity, and arriving there they find themselves surrounded in fascinating and friendly aliens. It can be a very rewarding place to stake a claim, no matter how small.
Common Family Structures
Religions
Native or Common Dress
Naming Conventions
History
We already know a little of Earth’s history: that they engineered the Pelted and that the Pelted fled Earth. The events that led to the creation of the Pelted on Earth are, as one would expect, riddled with political and social complexities. The initial project was a government-sponsored attempt to seed the universe with friendly aliens (Project Homefront), but the companies contracted to undertake the work were allowed to capitalize on the research and development, which meant that in addition to the government’s goals and efforts (and oversight), there were competing goals and efforts and oversight, with personalities clashing over the science, the ethics, and the practical aspects.
The Pelted were able to flee Earth successfully in part because the project was already imploding beneath scandal, lack of funding, and loss of the minds needed to successfully spearhead the scientific advances. This mess was representative of where Earth was heading with everything else at the time. After the Pelted made good their escape, humanity didn’t have long before they were embroiled with their next big problem, and it was game-changing: the Martian colony, which up until then had been one of the few economically productive parts of the solar system, decided it no longer wanted to bear the burdens of Earth’s failing economy. They sued for independence, and when Earth refused them, they started a war. At the end of that conflict, Mars was free… and the whole solar system was wrecked. A destitute Earth had no money to pay for its own repairs with Mars no longer contributing to its coffers… and Mars found itself facing the necessity of rebuilding almost from scratch after the ravages of the war…with a reluctant, embittered, and impoverished Earth as its only significant trading partner. Predictably, the relationship did not begin amicably, and resentment on both sides crippled the efforts to restore the Terran solar system to a space-capable society. The joke is that they bombed themselves back into the industrial age, and the joke isn’t far off the mark.
Roughly two centuries after their creation, the Pelted returned, cautiously but armored by their newborn navy and industrial power, to the solar system of their creators and found Earth in desperate need of help. Humanity was incapable of recovering from the war, both economically and politically, and the arrival of a rich new trading partner willing to help bootstrap them out of their hole was an enormous relief… or would have been, had that partner been anyone else. To have their former creations reappear with technologies they’d consigned to the realm of fiction was a severe blow to human morale. They had made the Pelted, and in no way remained their masters, and to this day the humiliation of having to beg for help has scarred the culture, politics, and psychology of humanity as a whole.
Entire books could be written on how delicately that Rapprochement was navigated (See Dar Allen(Sean)), with competing psychological issues on both parties’ sides, made more fraught by the economic and technological disparities and humanity’s terrible need. That it was brought off at all is something of a miracle. Humans joined the Alliance then, as a member—it didn’t have the power or the resources to do so as an ally—and has been hard at work on its own renewal ever since. But even with the Pelted’s help, Earth, Mars, and its settlements remain a “second world” solar system, and while humans are numerous enough that they could be a sizable population in the Alliance Core, few of them travel. The history that binds humanity and the Pelted makes it too difficult for many people to embrace the Alliance.
On the bright side, having the Pelted for neighbors has given Mars and Earth a common point of resentment, and while relations between the two planets remain prickly they are far more united now than they were before the Rapprochement.