Category:Raiey

Pronounced RAY-ee.

Raiey are a Cyantian race that are similar to Earth Rays and Skates. They, like all the undersea species did not originally have legs, but some have undergone genetic modification and now possess legs and are capable of coming on land. They possess large 'wings' separate from their arms that attach mainly along the spine down to the base of where the ribs meet the spine. From that point, they detach. They're too heavy to use for gliding. They're also thick and fold back along their body when not in the water to keep them out of the way. (They're useless on land - just like their ears, which previous generations of their kind do not have, and need to be protected.) While the first generation of altered Raiey had no hair, later generations were given the ability to grow hair. Tradeoff to being able to walk on land, they're not as good of swimmers as previous generations, but faster than any land based creature. Gills are in the same place on the chest in both males in females, although the bulges are not as prominent on the wider chests of males.

They can both use sonar and detect electrical/magnetic fields. They have a poisonous barb at the end of their tail for defense. Raiey are typically 5 to 6 feet tall, 5'5" being considered average. Raiey are the shortest and most delicate aquatic, with males and females being generally the same size. Their coloration is usually pale on the front with darker backs, and usually spotted, with colors ranging from grays, sandy browns, to the occasional dark reds.

The Raiey Landwalkers are the most vulnerable of the aquatic types to dehydration. They need water, full immersion every 48 hours. They'll be rather sick after 36 hours and hurting.

Psychology:

Culture:

Politics: Raiey tend to live in shallow water, thus have little contact with Craihs (which is good, considering in the past Craihs considered Raieys 'good eating'.) They do have contact with the Neefla, who act as go-betweens between them and the Craihs.

Religion: The Raiey religion is based around the idea that memory is the medium for the spirit. Exceptionally spiritual Raiey can, to a limited degree, communicated with their descendants via this memory by invoking certain memories. In addition, each spirit is "polarized" to some extent. Spirits who have roughly the same polarization find it easier to communicate. And it would take an exceptionally powerful spirit to communicate if they were of opposite polarization. Polarization takes into account not only their chosen profession, but their disposition towards helping or harming others as well.

In this way, a Raiey following a chosen profession merely carries the memories of other professions with them until one of their descendants chooses that profession. The memories will then be able to communicate with that individual.

A spirit survives by being remembered. In some cases, a spirit can manifest itself within memories of its living form that reside within someone close to them. While none of its own memories are available, it can then summon up memories of itself. This requires nearly full body contact at the time of death, and is frowned upon by a large portion of the population as the spirit cannot always be asked if they wish this to happen.

If no one remembers a particular spirit, it will slowly lose power. Eventually, a spirit loses the power to hold onto its memories, and drifts free of the body. Such spirits will, if not found and recovered, wander the oceans for eternity. These memory-less spirits can enter an undeveloped mind, removing all previous spirits and their memories from the body and taking it for themselves. This spirit, with no memories left, merges with the spirit of its new host. This usually only occurs to unborn children, and results in the birth of one without any inherited memories. The addition of a second spirit makes the child a beacon of sorts.

Some Raiey choose to take a different path to others. They learn to speak with their spirits, and in some exceptional cases speak with the spirits of others. Teachers are often moving along this path, their ability to remember all memories making them very versatile. While those with no inherited memories seem to learn faster by themselves, the spirits within the teacher are reaching out to the memory-less spirit in the child and showing it their memories.

Economy: Running on the assumption that temperature changes would be most likely due to shifting currents, or a deliberate act upon the Raiey's part, Raiey society would have something similar to a weather-man, except these ones keep a watch on currents and where they're shifting. Currents might randomly shift, or shift on a cyclical basis.

Farming communities would be built in the path of warm currents, forcing them to either issue their employees with pheromone suppressives, or hire those too young to be affected by the warmer waters. (An interesting "after-school" job for the younger Raiey?)

They mostly move out of the area when the temperatures change if they don't want to be in season. If a current shifted onto a biostruct research centre, they'd either shift it, or skeleton crew it in shutdown mode till the waters cooled...

Guessing they've got firm laws specifying that you don't run a biostruct experiment anywhere near a current, in case something goes wrong and the 'structs go wild... Don't want a minor disaster to become a major catastrophe... Specially if there's a population centre down-current...

Family: Raiey females go into season and begin releasing pheromones when the water reaches a certain temperature. Temperature changes would be most likely due to shifting currents, or a deliberate act upon the Raiey's part. Fertilization occurs via "the act" - apparently uncomfortable out of water, and also impossible to conceive if not in water - and eggs are laid, with a normal clutch containing approximately 20 eggs.

Non-landwalker Raiey lay their eggs in large communal nurseries, returning to collect their young once they had hatched, often not as many young as the number of eggs they'd laid, allowing infertile couples to have young as well. It takes Raiey roughly 5 years to mature, and they are able to look after themselves from this point. They will tend to look to their parents for support for a few years after this. Usually more in the case of those with no genetic memories, as they spend longer catching up with the standard level of knowledge.

Landwalker Raiey look after their own eggs, and lay less of them (1 to 4), although the eggs are larger and have a higher chance of survival. The young must then stay in the water for at least a year until their lungs have sufficiently developed to allow them to breath air.

Technology: Raiey are the most technologically advanced of the water species, and the most involved in original research. They tend to follow a structured approach toward research. Technology seems to be heavily based on 'biostructs' - basically a biological equivalent to nanites. Where the Neefla tend to do their research in family groups, with each family ending up with it's own unique set of biostructs, the Raiey tend toward standardization; part of why they're the most technologically advanced. The standardization also means that for anything that requires mass-production, Raiey are the best ones to call. Raiey invented the underwater version of a computer, as well as a type of tool belt.