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Sergals
- Species Type: Sapient Carnivore Marsupial
- Population: ~3 Billion
- Population Demographic Majority: Sergal/Neverean
- Common Language: Sagaru
- Government Type: Solgov Protectorate Democracy
Sergals are a species developed from carnivorous tree-dwelling primates/marsupials with strong, dense muscles made for climbing and lanky bodies supported by a thick tail. Their faces and heads are designed from a natural angle to kill with a few quick bites.
Sergals, or ‘Tree hunters’ in their common language are a male/female species that range from 1.8 meters to 2.5 meters in height with a lifespan of about 90-140 years naturally. Furred with muted, dull colors between greys and reds that make poor camouflage, yet allow them to find each other in canopies with ease. Over the past eighty years of contact it’s hypothesized sergals developed from a highly social breed of carnivorous hunters that used treetops to ambush prey, most likely living most of their lives in Tal’s sturdy branched trees that exist due to its oxygen-dense environment. Sergals live by the universally common male/female reproduction cycle with females giving live birth to one or two kits at a time over a gestation period of five months.
Supporting their dense climbing muscles is an oxygen-heavy circulatory system with a 4-valve heart and strong lungs. Their calorie needs are high due to their diet and body’s conditions.
In short, primitive hunters with strong, but taxing bodies that use communication and color signals to ambush live meat.
Despite xenophobic propaganda, sergals as a species were not village-dwelling savages before humanity was forced to contact them. They had been a roughly gunpowder-age species just about half a million years old since sapience became a common trait. Society for sergals had moved from canopy hunting and small communes to developed villages and stone/wood construction cities. Metallurgy was a common craft, along with animal husbandry of other mammals and mega-insects, along with currency, trade, government, literacy and a polytheistisc faith. Society at the time was best described as ‘feudal’ with clans that had developed from tribes holding and keeping territory as the species emerged into what it was.
A forced first-contact happened around 2360 when the contract freighter the ITV Antelope had a malfunction over Talvis-Epsilion III. Losing most of its cargo of military weapons in orbit. ‘Tal’ was an off-limits planet to any traders or contact by Solgov due to it’s primitive population that wasn’t ready for outside contact. Tracking beacons showed that the cargo had survived re-entry. Between losing millions in contracted weaponry and the possibility of a cargo cult, or worse forming on Tal, Sol had dispatched a special forces team with a strict ‘do not be seen, or engage’ policy to recover, or destroy the cargo. However a day into the mission it had become clear the natives had found the breached crates and begun to discover just what they found with no idea how, or where it came from.
Solgov’s hand was forced to make a quick and clean as possible first contact with the natives of Tal far too early than ethically acceptable. Despite propaganda of butchered and eaten diplomats, or wild xenophilic orgies, those entrusted to cross paths with sergal scouts and hunters were educated and clever and used both AI translation assistance and the ‘Big Three’ methods of first contact communication to convey intelligence and benign intent.(Shapes, counting and body language).
While communication was difficult at first, sergals were curious, if skittish people and word spread quickly of otherworld aliens who came in peace. Solgov’s diplomatic envoy firm to curb any wild speculation or claims of divinity or other damaging ideas that would harm relations and development.
Now far too early than they were ready for - the Sergal species has gone from the beginnings of civilized society to a transhumanist space age, with very little to guide them.
Where are sergls now? In short - all over with places they shouldn’t be, sergals now are divided into three generations. The oldest being pre-contact natives, the second oldest being post-contact born sergals… and recently very young sergals fully born into a space-age life with no ties to what Tal used to be.
Both for humanity and sergals this has had major political upheaval with neoprimitivism movements that demand the Sergal species cut all ties and return to Tal and forget contact ever happened. First generation warlords eager to come back to Tal and settle old grudges with automatic weapons and advanced armor, and progressives who embrace the sergal’s protectorate status with Solgov - as expected none of them get along.
Humanity isn’t immune either to the fallout of such a massive breach of first contact ethics. Xenophobic political groups both extreme and not jumped on the opportunity to push their message of an isolated humanity using sergals as an example and scapegoat, while ‘ecologist’ groups such as Prime Directive claim Solgov acted with too much haste and greed and spoiled an entire species. This has also raised questions just what voting and citizenship rights Sergals can or should get as a protectorate species and if being such is even ethical. It’s speculated by political majors that what’s in store for the species may not settle for a century or two, if at all.