The Species (Patreon)

I've been thinking about the species lately. I grew up reading all the old 1950's and 1960's sci-fi from this big thick collections as well as the 70's stuff. A lot of that was "WHOO HOO! ROCKET SHIPS AND SHIT!" and fun to read with the aliens having a decided "OK, wouldn't it be cool if..." bent. It's something I've been trying out, and I'm looking at the species a lot and deciding what I want to do and how it would effect their society and culture.

I was writing down my thoughts on the Rigellian Saurians and how the dimorphism between the sexes is so extreme (Female are big buff bipedal lizards, males are short squat feathered lizards that look like brown ducks) and then the parts on two other races.

A few people have mentioned it makes them a little uncomfortable that the brood-carriers are not quite as intelligent as the male and female. The big thing about consent (which, let's be honest, is a major thing in the story) and everything, and I started wondering if maybe I should just use the normal male/female dichotomy where they're all but cosmetically  the same.

Then I had a cigarette and was staring at the back porch when a big winged ant landed. She was bigger than a carpenter ant. I thought about some of the things you see in nature here on Earth.

Then I remembered that half the fun of this series is seeing alien species, their culture, their society, and how it's different than humans and in some cases, different than Terran allies.

So I decided I'd write the species the way I envision them, as I envision them, and see how it all works out.