Quarendai

The Quarendai are an avian species on the planet Progenios that, through climate change and related circumstances, came to live and evolve on the forest floor. The average Quaren stands 1.25 meters tall, weighing 50 kilos. Their appearance is analogous to an owl, with a few, but major, evolutionary changes that allowed them to become the dominant species on the world.

Instead of a world government, many city-states dot the world with the most powerful guiding the direction of the civilization through a pact that combines their resources in an effort to become a space faring species. Closely tied to the city-states is the Citizenship Policy, which aims to preserve a productive society while ensuring that the Quaren advance intellectually and culturally. Having exhibited a peaceful predisposition throughout their history, they are slow to seek violence as a solution to a disagreement. This is known as the Quaren Order.

The species has an intrastellar level of tech, having successfully completed crewed missions to the surfaces of two other planets in the system and many of the moons.

Homeworld and Natural Habitat
Progenios is the second planet in the Dabov system, the first of two planets in the habitable zone. Following an elliptical orbit with an eccentricity of approximately .1, Progenios has an orbital distance of 1.2 AU and a resulting orbital period of 480 earth days (384 locally), with a sidereal rotation of 30 hours. A large world, Progenios has roughly twice the surface area of the Earth, with a fairly higher gravity of 1.4g.

Climate
There are no seasons, as the planet maintains a nearly 0° axial tilt. This factor, combined with its proximity to Dabov and a denser atmosphere (relative to Earth), has created temperature zones bounded by latitudinal ranges. Temperatures on the planet range from -10C at the poles to 48C at the equator. The result is a planet with a mostly dry equator, wet temperate zone, and mostly dry poles. Due to its orbit (the focus is nearer to the perihelion), there are slight temperature changes that one might associate with seasons. The effect here is the equivalent of only a mildly colder "fall", "winter", and "spring". The only significance of this factor is that precipitation can encroach further into the normally dry areas during the approach and departure from the aphelion. Although the climate for each of the temperature zones is steady and predictable, there are geographical features in some areas that create atypical, localized climate effects within the normal system of weather patterns.

Geography
The surface of the planet is made up of a 75/25 split of water to land, with two continents in the western hemisphere accounting for most of the land. A smaller continent inhabits the eastern hemisphere, and runs east to west along the equator. To the southwest of this lone continent, a large island chain, the remnant of a former continent, dots the ocean.
 * Eastern Hemisphere – The elongated, lone continent of the eastern hemisphere runs along the equator. The lateral extent of the continent is much greater than its vertical extent, shaping it to look roughly like a long rectangle. Approximately 30% of the land mass of this continent is located in the northern hemisphere, with the remaining land hanging below the equator in the southern hemisphere. Due to this placement, all of the northern and a large chunk of the southern parts of the continent are scorching desert. Only in the portion of the continent in the higher southern latitudes will you find milder temperatures and a more varied ecology. The island chain is situated a great distance from the southwest shore of the continent and is well removed from any of the other land masses, being some 11,000km from its closest neighbor. Over 23,000 islands make up the island chain, though many of them are no more than exposed rocks, incapable of being permanently inhabited. A handful of larger islands and many medium sized islands capable of sustaining life do exist.


 * Western Hemisphere – This hemisphere contains approximately 80% of the world’s landmass, divided into two continents of roughly the same size. The shape and position of the two continents suggests that they formed one supercontinent not long ago, in geological terms. Both continents are almost exclusively situated in the northern hemisphere, with only a small portion of each dipping into the southern latitudes.

Appearance and Anatomy
Like their earthly analog, the owl, the Quarendai feature two sexes: male and female. On average, a female is slightly bigger than the male, though the difference in size continues to decrease from the earliest solid evidence of their stature. Outside of this difference, the two sexes can be distinguished by their plumage (females slightly more varied and colorful) and beak shapes (the males still have a slightly curved and hooked beak). In regard to reproduction, the female will lay one egg and, on average, will only lay three eggs over her window of reproduction. By and large, only two of these eggs will produce a viable chick. The average life expectancy is 123 Progenios years, or roughly 160 Galactic Years.

At a glance, the Quarendai have maintained many of their avian characteristics. They are still feathered, though their feathers are not as long or thick as they once had been. The characteristic colors of the species from their early days remain; browns, yellows, creams and blacks. One notable change is the shape of the beak, which is no longer characterized by a sharp hook, as the need to kill live prey has been generally phased out. The eyes remain fixed, and the head still needs to be rotated to change the field of vision.

Their form has undergone major change, as one would expect. Life on the ground led to a more upright posture, however, their posture could be described as “slightly hunched” to any species that walks completely upright. The typical individual stands at roughly 1.25 meters tall, with the tallest reaching upwards of 1.75 meters.

Quaren arms have undergone a major change as well. As the use of the wings increased in tasks such as nest building, and occurrence of flight decreased, the length of their arms shortened to better leverage their strength for lifting and pushing. Coupled with this change was the development of three additional digits, giving the species four fingers. With their arms held at their side, one can easily mistake their feathered arms for wings, though flight is not possible, as their average weight of 50 kilos prevents them from doing so. An advantageous carryover from their days of flying, the Quarendai boast proportionally strong arms from their highly developed chest muscles.

Quarendai Culture
Through the ages, the hallmarks of the Quaren culture have always been peace, the pursuit of knowledge and development of the culture. With the exception of The Great Decay and early conflicts between classical city-states, the Quarendai have always sought peace. This is an attitude that has prevailed over the millennia, since the species began to live closer to the ground, and the threat of larger predators was ever present. The existence of this peace afforded modern Quarendai the ability to seek knowledge and the arts, being wholly safe from natural predators and the thought of intra-species violence not even in the realm of the general consciousness. In your average community you will encounter a higher proportion of scholars, artists and entertainers than in most cultures.

The Citizenship Policy is an important staple of the culture and guides the lives of a very large portion of the population. Nearly every city-state uses the Citizenship Policy to drive the development of young minds, ensuring that intellectual advancement proceeds and creating a culture of productivity within the borders of the city-state. This is achieved by guaranteeing a number of social policies, the most important of which is free education and career training beginning from the earliest ages until adulthood (it’s not uncommon for a Quaren to already be paired prior to exiting the system). Within the system are a number of stages and checkpoints used to measure the development of the student in their field. A history of low marks or a complete failure at any one checkpoint is grounds for a citizenship conference, where the potential citizen is reviewed and their future decided. The earliest this can occur is when the student in question has passed the age that all Quarendai are considered adults, around 45 Galactic Years old. More often than not, the student chooses a life in the service field (manual labor and other service jobs) and is immediately made a citizen. A very few, usually gifted but unmotivated, are allowed a second chance in their field. The remaining students are denied citizenship during the conference and are given a one way ticket to the closest independent city outside of the city-state borders. It’s this part of the policy and its poor first implementation that led to The Great Decay.

History
The foundation of modern Quaren culture began to be exhibited around the same time that cities began to encroach upon each other’s hunting grounds and area of control. Still deferring to peaceful melding instead of conflict, uneasy border agreements were established between cities that were mostly developing separate ideologies. Most would come to make the agreements work, even leading to the eventual combination of the cities in most cases. However, violent conflict did ensue between cities that could not abide their agreements. These came to be collective known as “The Fugue”, as all sides of the conflict were shunned for turning their back on the belief that their culture had stood by from earliest memory: to always protect Quaren life. The results of these conflicts had ramifications that still affect the geographical and political landscape today.

The process of city and community merging continued until the city-states that represent today’s political power were formed. The hallmark policies and ideologies of these governing bodies took root. The Citizenship Policy was established and adopted by most of the powers. This policy laid out the adoption of a welfare-state style of government, guaranteeing anyone who earned citizenship a livelihood. As with any sweeping political policy, a negative underside developed over time. Those who didn’t earn citizenship were banished to the villages and towns outside of the city-state’s area of control. Generations of outcasts gravitated to each other, forging a movement against the city-states and their policy. This led to an uprising and related war that came to be known as The Great Decay, in which a rudimentary army was formed from some of the most disenfranchised and outspoken outcasts. This army stormed the preeminent city-state of the time, Patram, targeting government and academic districts. In the wake of the initial attack, many high ranking and influential citizens were killed before a force could be summoned to push back the attackers. A siege of Patram ensued. When neighboring city-states caught wind of the attack they were appalled at the wanton disregard of life. Invoking a distorted version of the Quaren Order: a force of united city-states utterly crushed the uprising and razed the villages and towns from where the most influential of the dissidents hailed. This was a dark moment in Quaren history, the bilateral extermination of life, a terrible lapse of the Quaren Order, stunned many. The initial attack left many speechless; the violent counter by the united city-states rocked the society as a whole. After the war a conference was held that pulled in leaders from almost every city-state across the globe. A complete restoration and re-emphasis of the Quaren Order was agreed with the addition that any organized violence would be stamped out by the united city-state front.

After the uprising the city-states flourished once again. New city-states would rise to political and cultural power as the population grew, while others became stale and stagnant as time passed them by. The villages, towns and fledgling cities that lay beyond the direct influence of the city-states regrouped and sought treaties with the city-states as a token of trust that they wouldn’t allow another event such as The Great Decay to occur. Some villages grouped together to create small federations and allied states, both to pool resources and to provide protection to one another in case the power of any one city-state decided to rise and commit a vengeful act down the line.

The Citizenship Policy persevered through The Great Decay, with some alterations to provide an even wider safety net after it was found that an appreciable amount of the rebels failed to earn their citizenship due to technicalities and politics. As always, the emphasis of the society remained on academics and culture. After The Great Decay, a movement in the academic community began to closely study methods of space travel, fearing that the fabric of their society had irreversibly broken down with the atrocities committed on both sides of the war. Their ultimate goal was the colonization of Aliucono, if possible. If not, some other celestial body perhaps.

As modern technology developed and sending a Quaren into space was not only feasible, but a near reality, a group of nine city-states, all influential in their own way, created a pact to provide the resources for the final push to see a Quaren in space. This group included the foremost religious, militaristic (relatively), economic and cultural city-states on Progenios. Each had their own agenda, but without each other, the mission would take centuries to come to fruition under any one of the city-states. Within a decade of the pact the first representative of the species set foot on the Petralba, their moon, placing a metal tree with the representative symbols of the Quaren species engraved, a unifying moment in their history.