Aliens and Empires
I'll be posting here from time to time to start giving people info on bad guys out there, setting info, etc. Because this immediately affects a couple of the characters, or gives info on them anyway, I'm going to start with the currently set knowledge on major players on the cosmic scene:
1. The Swarm:
http://listsoplenty.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/bullet-ant-close-up.jpgOnce a vast empire ruled by a vastly powerful telepath called the Hive Queen, these insectoid aliens were scattered from their collective when the Rellurites killed the Hive Queen. Some lesser queens have formed their own colonies, turning them into crime syndicates and other lesser versions of mini-empires, while many other Swarmlings have gone independent.
They are intelligent, resistant to telepathy except their own, and can communicate silently with other swarm nearby. They have no conventional morals beyond loyalty to a hive if they belong to one, and will die to protect a queen they have adopted. They lift 10-20 tons on average, depending on what type they are - worker, warrior, etc. with more and more specialized variants showing up all the time. They are also resistant to most injury.
The biggest problem is that their tendencies as swarming imperialists and scavangers has led to them becoming the galaxy's worst criminals. Con artists, thieves, pirates, brigands, thugs - you name it. Without a hive, individual swarm are almost never craftsmen or service industry workers - those are roles they only develop/specialize into when part of a society. So if you see one out and about, they're usually engaged in some less than moral/legal means of surviving.
2. Rellurites -
For most of their history, the Rellurites lived on a single planet, with a bizarre religion speaking of them being descended from ancient gods and spanning the stars. When a Swarm ship crashed on the planet Rell, they managed to adapt the technology, and got out into the stars... again. It turned out they had been banished to Rell by a mysterious race of interdimensional guardians to keep them somewhat in check, because each Rellurite is a powerhouse able to match up with a warship of most races. (think Daxamites/Kryptonians) when they are not exposed to the low level radiation of Rell.
They reproduce slowly, and while they have built an empire, their population has expanded only very slightly over that that occupied the planet Rell. As such, their imperial structure usually involved half a dozen Rellurites in any population as royalty and governors, with millions or billions of members of other species for every Rellurite.
Most Rellurites are bastards. Their system of government is reasonably fair mostly just in that there's only a few of them compared to anyone else in their vast empire, and they do not need to eat, drink or breathe, so keeping them happy is relatively easy - but they're definitely focused on their own happiness first. There is also the matter that while they rarely sleep, every Rellurite must undergo about a 4 hour period once a week during which they are completely helpless and cannot wake up - so it pays to keep some friends and loyalists around and not upset planetary populations /too/ much. For the most part, think Romans at the pre-decadence height of power.
After defeating the Swarm, they have not been posed many other major threats, leaving them to expand slowly ever since.
3. Shifters - Friendly people who are telepathic among their own. Talk to Kate and Beth for more info. So far, they are well outside Rellurite borders and not in any immediate danger, but they do have problems with rogue Swarm.
