Goners

They are the primary species of the Goner Empire (I know, such creativity) and also directly canonically descended from velociraptors no you shan't ever learn about how that's even possible.

Basic Information

Anatomy

Take your typical tiny feathered velociraptor. Say bye-bye to the feathers. Adjust the hips and shoulders a bit so that they can stand upright like humans do. They still have vestigial tails. Add the feathers back in the form of tiny, sharp quills that most Goners pluck out. Females are on average slightly larger and about as colourful on average as males (Goners are colourful all the time but increased blood flow near the surface of the skin makes colours already present more bright and vibrant during breeding seasons).

Biological Traits

They vary massively in colour to the point where it used to be believed that every individual who didn't have an identical twin was unique in their colouring. In truth it's just dependant on so many genetic factors that the odds of running into an individual with the same colouration as oneself are extraordinarily low.

Genetics and Reproduction

They have a breeding season an average of once every one of their homeworld's years but this isn't specially tied to anything on their planet.

Females who are experiencing poor conditions or weather (lack of sunlight, malnutrition, etc) may experience theirs several months later, but also female's cycles will generally sync up as a form of collective evolution that allows for communal egg protection (if all the females lay their eggs around the same time they can all just be stuffed into the same defensible spot for just a few of their clan to guard and tend to them while everyone else works on getting food etc. For females with lower qualities of life due to having a low status in the clan that would normally be passed onto their children this also served as a way to secretly swap out one's own eggs with that of a female whose children were guaranteed higher qualities of life, basically cuckooing them).

Females who partake in more breeding seasons will remain fertile longer in addition to having more offspring anyway because they've got a less extreme version of how female ferrets can literally die from not breeding, with their less extreme version simply being that they experience menopause sooner, are physically weaker and have slightly shortened lifespans... just to clarify this is what naturally happens almost every factor in this section has been being averted, reduced or even intensified depending on an individual's wants and needs (this includes the next section on males) since before this species first found metalworking through various medicines, albeit usually in secret as most societies in Goner history have been extremely pro "make them babies we got enemies to outnumber".

Males turned on by pheromones released by the females when it's mating time, but also become drowsy because of a second set of pheromones females release to put males into a passive state while mating so that they don't seek out other females (which could cause divided loyalties if providing for the offspring of 2 different mates) and stay put, which also gives her access to the, uh... entirety of his gamete production as a means to ensure all eggs are fertilised as the more limited constraints of their breeding has created an evolutionary pressure for females to make the biggest use possible out of each window is the best way to phrase it.

Females will sometimes seek to attract multiple males, especially if there are more males than females, for this reason as well as to secure the assistance of more males as, for example, having 3 males each be the father of a different one of 3 offspring from a breeding season means one adult putting their time and energy into each child, or even more males than offspring that contribute due to the possibility of offspring being theirs (DNA tests in the Goner are not only easy to mass produce but state mandated as a means for the government to gather more information on its citizens, with the side effect of paternity fraud being a thing of the past), plus there's the bonus of preventing other females from having kids which means more food and resources for their own.

While this sounds like females competing with each other over males it generally instead just works out as repetitive pairs forming because males have evolved their own tactic around all of this: get with females that don't already have a mate so that all of the offspring are yours, so females competing generally only happens if there's fewer males - in which case competition is simply over having kids at all - or more males - in which case competition is over getting to get that aforementioned reduced division of resources among children by increasing the amount of providers (it should be noted that despite all this effort females do in fact gather and hunt for food for their offspring as well, it's just so much easier if there's another individual doing the same per child).

If all of this stuff sounds kinda manipulative and messed up the only truly monogamous species on Earth are a parasitic worm literally all the other monogamous species you heard about will cheat on their partners if it's both beneficial to their own genes and the opportunity arises and since I wanna hit you right where you've probably been made to think there's nothing but monogamy we're going with birds, which as it happens are related to our aliens in question anyway, today: https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/birds-mate-life-cheat/story?id=18949572 https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070620110651.htm . Morality is only present when it's advantageous such as to ensure cohesive groups, and even that can be outweighed by the often individualistic selfishness of gene propagation.

Oh also both sexes naturally sing, including the use of mating calls. They sound kinda like a cross between opera singers and geese, although sometimes they sound more like canaries or Jurassic Park velociraptors.

Growth Rate & Stages

They take 14 years to become adults on average, although calling them "mature" by this age is pretty much always a stretch.

Ecology and Habitats

They originated in vast jungles where standing upright was a way to look out for danger in the underbrush and made climbing easier.

Dietary Needs and Habits

Naturally primarily carnivorous, with a diet consisting largely of different bugs. That said they do eat small amounts of fruits, berries and shoots.

Biological Cycle

They generally live to about 50 years naturally, although modern medicine extends this to the 90s for the wealthy.

Additional Information

Social Structure

Naturally it's a lot of might makes right combined with deliberately ensuring that the offspring of those lower than you in the clan are in perpetual undernourishment while your kids eat as much as they want so that your kids end up strong and those of others weak and so they can't change the balance. In the modern day, it's more of the same but with more middlemen, an even wider gap and it being less about starvation and more about general exploitation.

Domestication

They've domesticated themselves if anything.

Uses, Products & Exploitation

Their skin is considered valuable and the African Resistance Alliance pays 50 American dollars for every Goner skull brought to them, including members of the vanilla species (that sounds like very little but 1. They've only got so much money 2. There are plenty of people desperate enough to go for as little as half a dollar and 3. exchange rates, especially exchange rates from a country that's untouched and has a very strong economy to one that was already considered a developing nation beforehand and has had much of its development rolled over and blown up by both sides and probably has a huge crime problem).

Facial characteristics

Ridges, markings and so on all vary wildly for this species. This is partially because even members of the vanilla species usually have some modified genes in them as there was a period of great disunity with a lot of free areas and some nations allowing freedom of genetic modification before the formation of the Goner Empire.

Geographic Origin and Distribution

Spread across all sorts of places in the galaxy, although this is somewhat reduced by the "dude their life expectancy is so low that they've got a declining population we cannot have this happening to our vanilla species seize them relocate them and then put some worthless slave species in to maintain productivity and suffer in their place" style of the Goner Empire.

Average Intelligence

On average they're less cunning and inventive compared to humans but have better memories. Their reaction times are generally just a little faster.

Perception and Sensory Capabilities

Much like squirrels, the range of their eyesight where they have depth perception is smaller than that of humans but they can see in wider arcs around their heads due to their eyes being on the sides of their heads. Their hearing kinda sucks as their ears lack Pinnas (clue: it's the part of the ears that sticks out of the head; cats, dogs and bats also have them but lizards and snakes don't if you're just confused by that) but they have a somewhat better sense of smell. Their skin is slightly thicker than that of humans which makes them less sensitive to light touching like that from spiders walking on their skin. They have some vestigial ability to smell the air through their mouth as well as their nose, although this isn't particularly useful outside of "wait a second I recognise this scent this is poison" clutches.

Symbiotic and Parasitic organisms

They used to use worms that digested fruits, shoots etc so that they could access minerals that might be harder to find living primarily off of bugs but modern Goners use cooler genetically engineered ones that allow them to eat a far wider variety of foods.

Civilization and Culture

Naming Traditions

The name of the subspecies is usually incorporated into the name by parents to show that their child will grow up dedicated to their preset role in society. For the base species, however, this doesn't apply and so names are usually made in reference to at least one of the gods of their religion.

Major Organizations

The Goner Empire, various outcast societies. The Goner Empire itself contains numerous massive organisations which generally work on a need-to-know basis, including state-owned media. If you wanna know anything more than rumours about the Silent Keepers (whose job is to document and store all information, as well as guard it from those whose positions don't allow them access to that information. They have their tongues and vocal chords removed in addition to replacing their bones with robotic ones that lock up whenever they're not on the job storing or sharing info so that it's much more difficult for any of them to share any of that information when they're not meant to. This is of course in addition to having tracking devices and explosives implanted into them so they can't ever leave the specified areas they're allowed in) you've gotta join the Silent Keepers - although this is especially the case for the Silent Keepers.

Beauty Ideals

Eyes that face forward but allow wide range of vision on either side, sharp teeth and claws, colourful scales and plumage, physical fitness, intelligence (especially cunning). That said even the "base" species has many modified genes in its pool and this has included some which alter what an individual finds attractive. Females generally prefer a male that is slightly smaller than them (they evolved in jungles with massive dinosaur-like predators being small enough for stealth was important but so was being able to bully others into giving food, which has created this balance) while larger female = more attractive to males as they generally guard nests more than they go out and gather food and bullying others into giving up their food is more the job of females since they spend more time in the communal nests (the species no longer lives in nests this is a natural / evolutionary history thing).

Gender Ideals

Females are expected to raise and guard offspring while males are expected to be the primary providers. Both are expected to have as many offspring in monogamous relationships as possible. Only infertile females are allowed in the military. Both are expected to be loyal to the death to their family/clan, although loyalty to the state is considered even more important.

Courtship Ideals

"You, child of my younger sibling. You are going to be married to the grandchild of the leader of this other clan that we're befriending. Breeding season is estimated to be about 2 months from now so we're sending you over / they're sending theirs and we're just gonna be locking you in a room together during that."

That said, members of the working class don't have to worry as much about things like alliances or appearances and so as much as the permission of the leaders of both clans are still required they're more likely to say no on the basis of "granddaughter no I don't care how beautiful his voice is or if he's beautiful on the inside he's too ugly I don't want ugly great grandkids" than "it doesn't match my secret plan for our clan to ascend in power".

Relationship Ideals

Romantic stories are considered sacrilegious for suggesting how much either within a couple like each other should actually matter or, even worse, that they should have any say in who they marry. Marriages are viewed like business relationships, with a bonus of "no divorce unless you go through a ridiculous and life-threatening ceremony before the gods and you cannot marry anyone else after", except the business is between the clan leaders of those getting married. Inbreeding is considered wrong, yet is also often forced upon slaves to increase the odds of getting desired traits, so hearing that someone has married within their clan will always stiffen those within earshot unless you clarify "one of them was adopted into the clan" or "it's a really big clan they're like 5th cousins".

Average Technological Level

Plasma guns, kinetic (basically forcefield) armour, ships that can magnify gravity one way and de-magnify it another to accelerate up to almost the speed of light (although accelerating to this speed generally takes a few months or on older ships years), they also reverse-engineered portal technology which they're able to use to make 0.1 millimetre circumference portals which are used primarily for instant transfer of information over massive distances (the machines that create these portals are the size of cars and very delicate, and when any 2 of them are in communication with each other one of them has to be kept in a 0 gravity environment which no they cannot replicate without actually putting - or more accurately making - one in space to prevent certain gravity-related problems).

Major Language Groups and Dialects

The primary language, known by humans as the Goner Tongue, is... uh it's the primary language pretty much also used in law and government. There's millions of other languages, most of them more accurately being dialects based off the Goner Tongue.

Common Etiquette Rules

Mostly the same "don't be gross" stuff but also if you're at someone else's place or someone who is higher ranked than you is present you wait until they've started eating before you start eating.

Common Dress Code

For members of the working class it's nothing but practicality and pheromone prevention except on holy days when clothing that is generally temporarily given out by religious institutions (they can generally expect about 10% of it to actually be returned) is to be worn. Pheromone prevention consists of covering the belly and genital areas as they're where most pheromone release takes place.

Nobles are a lot more snazzy and generally tailor their clothing to their scales and plumage, although they're still expected to be modest in the sexual sense (although that boundary is pushed - no, shoved - very often).

History

Skipping the predictable history of developing intelligence, tribal warfare somewhat honing their cunning (although memorising what was and wasn't safe to eat turned out to be more important to their survival and spread as a species) we can just skip to them dominating their home solar system.

Claiming their solar system, a trinary star system with far more asteroids and planets than our own, when their home planet wasn't united yet and their technology still meant that crossing from one part of the solar system to another could take decades resulted in a huge fracturing of countless nations and communities of all sorts with all sorts of government systems. It remained more or less this way, albeit with states merging through union and conquest and the population growing and science advancing, for several hundred years.

This is where a lot of their genetic variety, which there was already plenty of, came from as modifications to suit different environments were made or otherwise applied to slaves (oh yeah there was slavery. A lot of it) in order to increase their usefulness or selling value, with some major corporations even using it as a form of permanent branding on their slaves causing much of the variety in colouration.

Well, this didn't last too long as one individual started a small cult of about 50 members in which he or she brainwashed all of the members while teaching them brainwashing techniques for them to use. They split up Scooby Doo style and around 30 of them were able to start cults of their own.

The most successful of them and grandpa/ma (it's unknown if they were trans, non-binary or just cisgender with amazing fashion sense, but the fact that they had kids at all indicates they were attracted to the opposite biological sex) to the first individual to hold the title of Emperor was known for a lot of publicity stunts. This included being biologically male but dressing in ways traditionally reserved for females, specifically females of high standing in society such as members of megacorp families and nobility (which mostly just consisted of former megacorp families that legitimised themselves by getting their kids to pair with those who had even the vaguest, often fabricated relations to old noble families), but would usually not wear clothes attributed to a matriarch of such a family out of respect to their initial brain washer as the true matriarch/patriarch of the "cult family".

The cults in question were all extremely similar (the tiniest differences did pop up and yes even the tiniest things are gonna be big enough for civil wars) derivations of an already popular but declining religion based primarily off of going "this is totally a metaphor for supernovas and stuff bruh" to explain all the scientific issues. It was already easy to tie it into space stuff since a lot of the original religion was based around astrology, particularly those 2 nearby stars.

The cults, especially that of the grandma/pa of the Emperor, grew over time and took over governments, forming alliances until the rest of the solar system was like "well I see where this is going if we don't stop it right goddamn now" and the vast majority of it declared war on the cults. The most successful of the cult leaders got leadership of the cult alliance because "my fleets are bigger than yours."

The war was going sort-of-badly for the cultists in that they had much higher casualties than the nations with more experienced military leaders (many of whom had defected out of cultist territory), better equipment and regularly had to extort their followers to afford mercenaries.

One somewhat insane cultist, having formerly been property of a megacorp but personally bought by the Cultist Alliance leader because they checks historical notes ah yes they were bought with the intent for use as a sex slave but the Cultist Alliance leader suddenly found their insanity less attractive when it was paired with extreme technological intelligence yet still considered them useful, figured out a means of getting around the primary armour that Goner soldiers on both sides were using, kinetic armour (basically force fields that obey the law of conservation of momentum), with a funky substance that was already being harnessed for energy: plasma.

The plasma guns were still new and released before being fully developed and so despite the new cultist weapons firing sun-juice, they seriously lacked range and didn't kill in one hit, instead melting the wiring of an area of the enemy's armour and causing agonising burns (which didn't go well with the melted armour getting into the burns) that served as an opening for any other weapon to be used to land the actual kill. Throw in a bonus of every plasma gun having explosives that can be remotely activated inside of them and you've got yourself a ridiculously tactically useful weapon that the enemy can't really grab any of for blueprints.

This was paired with the rescuing/placing under new management of the first Grimarks, which were intended as supersoldiers for sale to both sides by a mega-corporation but negotiations going poorly resulted in the cultists raiding the megacorp's facilities before they could sell anything to the anti-cultists, and well they're supersoldiers what more do you need? They were indoctrinated - made a whole lot easier by them being rescued (in all fairness to the claims of rescuing, the Grimarks got far better qualities of life with the cultists than they would've staying with the megacorp or most of the nations that would've bought them, and after the war got some very nice benefits) - by the cultists and did genetic super soldier stuff.

These 2 factors together, as well as internal sabotage and bickering by the anti-cultists due to a mixture of basic differences and cultist infiltrators messing them around, allowed the cultists to reign victorious over the Goner System.

Sure, the first gravity-accelerator tech had been figured out during the war and used for both long-range bombardment and the sending of much larger amounts of faster ships than ever before beyond the Goner System with such ships being mostly full of those who didn't want to live under cultist rule, but that's not a problem that can be kept from growing too exponentially by sending faster-than-any-ship missiles after anything leaving the system without your approval and there were internal issues to focus on...

1. Spread the religion to make everyone a cultist.

2. Lots of compromises with surrendered nations. One nation that was fully conquered might have to put up with the religion replacing basic mathematics in state education but one that conditionally surrendered while it still had some firepower to spare only had to suffer allowing missionaries in as well as frequent terrorism.

3. There were tiny differences in what the cults preached as, despite being accurate to what the first brainwasher had taught their victims, there'd been some gaps to fill that the different cult leaders filled differently and on top of that new ones had appeared capitalising or being religiously inspired by the others whose interpretations deviated even further than those of the original cultists.

4. Aside from cleaning up the differences, who's actually in charge?

5. So many subspecies and crossbreeds between different subspecies... what exactly are the rules regarding those?

All of which would slowly be resolved to create the eugenic racial-segregationist fascist-but-later-more-feudal-with-fascist-elements theocratic state that would be the Goner Empire, conquer those outer nations formed by the refugees, and then expand further to encounter and enslave other species. And no, the resolutions were rarely anything close to peaceful there were about 13 large-scale civil wars over this stuff in the first 300 years of its existence. And for all that effort to consolidate all of that the religion would mutate and warp in all sorts of interesting ways from place to place as it got larger anyway, even if the finding of such mutations was generally met with the use of re-education camps and occasional extreme violence that escalated into small civil wars.

By about 500 years in those actual resolutions were:

1. Religion spread successfully.

2. All nations successfully subverted over time and either dissolved into the Empire or have figureheads who follow and enforce the religion anyway.

3. Whatever the Tongues of the Gods say is the right interpretation is the right interpretation. They've documented all their beliefs in files but hold the right to say "huh? What's that Mr/Mrs Gods? Oh? You've changed your mind on that as part of your Great Plan? Okie Dokie" and just casually modify things, which has caused a whole lot of trouble over time because of how stupidly easy it is to abuse this for personal gain and power.

4. The Emperor is the leader of the Tongues of the Gods, military and basically everything in theory but is really just a figurehead whose often caught in the midst of the power games of others, although there have been Emperors in Goner history who just went "nah m8 I'm in charge innit" and survived enough of the assassination attempts to actually make things they wanted to happen happen. This has absolutely caused numerous civil wars.

5. "Every subspecies is a part of the creations of the gods... so they're not allowed to interbreed yep totally cos of that and not just that 2 crossbreeds who are kinda good at 2 things aren't as useful as one of 2 different subspecies who are each really good at one of those 2 things haha right guys?" ... this caused a civil war.

That's about it yeah.

Interspecies Relations and Assumptions

They literally think that their gods made the galaxy for them and that other species exist to serve them.

Scientific Name

bipedal corcodillus intelligentes

Origin/Ancestry

Velociraptors. Yes. But they also came to Earth from outside of it. There's a lore explanation I promise.

Average Height

4 feet when stretched upright, but in comfortable positions generally 3'6 or so.

Average Weight

90 lbs

Average Physique

Most are quite far below their full physical potential as labour is done primarily by slaves and machines.

Body Tint, Colouring and Marking

Includes some colours that aren't even on the human range of the visible spectrum. If it exists it's a colouration and pattern that's possible and also probably the result of someone getting very aesthetic with how they decided to genetically modify their children.