Post #226 August 24 2020 “Aliens on Earth: Re-starting an Existing Series” In about a year or so, I will be restarting my series The Farpool Stories, with a new title… The Farpool: Plague. I’m planning on doing at least 3 more stories, including this one. Here’s the basic plot: Much of Humanity has been lost to a plague; Amphibs have deliberately infected Man (ostensible motive: to stop Man’s destruction of their ocean habitat) but Amphibs survive and inherit most of human civilization, including leadership roles in many fields. Story largely told by Seomish/human Amphib historian Likto klu kel:Om’t. Plague made by Ponkti biowar scientists in effort to make Amphibs and Seomish (Ponkti) masters of Urku (Earth) and to stop destruction of Earth’s oceans by over-development. Plague obtained by Komik ka kel: Ponk’et by traveling through Farpool back to time before Seome was destroyed and obtaining mah’jeet toxin, which he later modifies and injects into a virus genome he has cultured. Komik wants to get rid of Notwater people and make Urku and its oceans safe for Amphibs and unmodified Seomish (especially Ponkti). Komik will work with renegade Chinese biowar scientists. Komik is himself Amphib, descended from Lektereenah For those of you who have read some of the later titles in The Farpool Stories, the reappearance on Earth of creatures called Amphibs should come as no surprise. They are the descendants of the original Seomish who emigrated to Earth’s oceans through the Farpool when their home world of Seome was threatened by a supernova of their sun. The Amphibs are hybrids, modified to survive both in Earth’s oceans and on land. As such, they are shunned by both the original emigrants and by land-dwellers like you and me. Their motive (at least the motive of renegade scientist Komik ka (see above) is to carve out a survivable niche on Earth for Amphibs to make their own way. You can see the possibilities for conflict here. Here are a few notes I made on Amphibs: 1. Appearance and physiology Amphib stands for amphibious. The conicthyosis procedure creates an amphibious, bipedal terrestrial vertebrate form, with two legs, two arms, etc. However, the amphib retains some characteristics of an amphibious creature. An amphib has gill sacs in slightly protruding pouches under its arms. It has skin that supports cutaneous respiration and must be kept moist at all times. There is some residual webbing between fingers and toes. There are some additional skin folds around the eyes and an extra protective layer of tissue inside the eye socket, to help the Amphib protect its eyes when submerged. Amphib eyes are notable for long periods of staring and fixation, as amphibians do not exhibit saccadic eye movements, but must ‘fix’ an object in their visual field to activate cognitive circuits to analyze and respond properly to the stimulus. Amphibs also have electroreceptors in their skin, which allows them to sense and locate objects nearby when they are submerged, by alteration of existent electrical fields. 2. Social organization (families and other hierarchies) Amphibs converted through conicthyosis generally retain the social structures of their previous form. Converted from land-dwellers, like humans, amphibs typically associate in small groups, like tribes or clans, not necessarily biologically related. Some critics refer to these social groups as ‘gangs.’ Converted from more fish-like or icthyotic forms, amphibs retain social organization common to fish, i.e. schools, pods and similar familial groupings. Often these social structures are matrilineal in nature. Amphibs with a Seomish heritage cluster in groups reminiscent of small kels. In general, amphibs are socially gregarious people. They collaborate and live together in small groups, previously known formally among anthropologists as clutches, troops, or bands. One term coming into common use among anthropologists now is a social grouping called a clik. 3. Beliefs and values Amphibs are strongly family or clan oriented. Human hybrid Amphibs retain many of the beliefs of their formerly human past. Marine (Seomish) hybrid Amphibs retain beliefs from their icthyotic past. That said, there are some beliefs and values unique to Amphibs. Amphibs are by nature environmentally conscious and acutely aware of the connectedness of all life, land and sea. They are also aware that they are a created people (they revere Dr. Josey Holland as a sort of ‘goddess’) and they believe that their creation and the coming of their Seomish cousins through the Farpool in 2115 was divinely inspired. As such, they take part of their creation story from the Seomish and part from Human myths. In general, Amphibs have a ‘network’ view of life. Their belief in a central creator is disappearing and they view the web of life as their main metaphor, with each Amphib morally and ethically responsible for doing their part to maintain the web and do nothing to damage it. When Amphibs refer to The Web, this is what they are referring to. Sometimes, they adapt the Seomish word for God (Shooki) as a stand-in for the Web. Many Amphib beliefs resemble Buddhist beliefs, especially their beliefs in First Things (Buddhist ‘Noble Truths’) and their belief in a cycle of life. Their beliefs center around a feeling of ‘Oneness’ or unity with the Web of Life. There are also elements of Gaian belief in how Amphibs think about their world. Amphib followers of Gaianism state that the term is based both on the felt connection and scientific understanding of the biosphere, which is given the name Gaia. The namesake primordial deity from Greek mythology is the mother of all beings, both god and animal, born from her union with the sky (Uranus) and the sea (Pontus). Gaians believe that naming the biosphere Gaia helps encourage practitioners and others to see the living planet as an organism with an intrinsic personality that expresses itself through evolution. Gaianism's philosophy stems from James Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis, which proposes that organisms interact with their surroundings on earth to form a more complex and self-regulating system that contributes to maintaining the conditions for life on the planet.[3] Gaia can be understood as a super-organism made of organisms, as multi-cellular life can be understood as a super-organism at a smaller scale. With a strong connection between Gaia beliefs and their own beliefs, Amphibs promote similar ethical practices. To wit: Amphibs typically approach their philosophy with the perspective that you should honor the earth, reduce or soften the their impact on the earth, and to be respectful of all life on earth. The latter perspective is extended to all forms of life such as plant, animal, or human, and followers will often try to maintain a close relationship with the planet in order to strive toward world peace, maintain global homeostasis and find inner fulfillment. There is an offshoot belief among some Seomish Amphibs that the sea people should work toward developing and perfecting the Farpool so as to return to Seome in a time earlier (before the ak’loosh) and work to prevent their sun from detonating in supernova. This belief would require them have the technology and the will to ally themselves with the Umans of the 32nd century to defeat the Coethi who so damaged Sigma Albeth B with starballs that it went supernova. This is the most desirable end state for all Seomish amphibs (called Kel’vik’t, meaning to ‘go against the current’) but Human amphibs don’t share this longing and so conflict arises among Amphibs over this matter. There is also a variant of Amphib belief that wishes to encourage other suitable marine life forms (like cetaceans) to undergo conicthyosis and become amphibs as well. Were this belief to become common and the technology to accomplish it perfected, there could be people walking the Earth who had once been dolphins, whales, etc. Not many Amphibs really want this to happen though. 4. What they like They like the feeling of going from the world of land and air to the world of the sea, and cruising just below the water’s surface. The Amphib saying for this is ‘sliding.’ Often, Amphib children and even adults can be found in the open ocean, simply breaching the surface like whales and ‘sliding’ back into the water. These groups are called by Human anthropologists and biologists ‘sliders.’ This is a well-loved and popular social activity for many Amphib cliks. Other terms related to Amphib breaching behaviors are porpoising, wave-riding, spotting. 5. What they don’t like Noisy surface craft or aircraft nearby their cliks. Any kind of human-created underwater disturbance. Amphibs think of the oceans as their territory, even though they can operate on land as well. They uniformly don’t like submersibles of any type and have sometimes taken to attacking submarines in groups. Amphibs from a Seomish background are especially sensitive to certain noises, owing to their racial memory of the Uman wavemaker on Seome (the Time Twister). In re-starting this series, I find myself deep in the world of creating believable aliens. This is something all sf writers face at some point. There are as many ideas on how to do this as there are practitioners, but the following are some of my ideas…things a would-be sf alien-creator should consider…. 1. Develop a background…a history of the aliens. You’ve seen some of my work above. Believe me, there is a whole appendix (at the end of many of The Farpool Stories) that details Seomish history and how they came to be. As the author, ask yourself this: how did your aliens get to this point (at which the story begins)? When you can answer this, you’re ready to create and portray realistic aliens in a real story. 2. What is the basic conflict? In my abbreviated plot summary above, the basic conflict is between Amphibs and everybody else. They are hybrids of two worlds—human and Seomish—and are shunned by both. One renegade Amphib scientist thinks he has a way of resolving this conflict…by killing off the humans. You can imagine that his intended targets would likely object. Here’s the basic conflict of the story. 3. How do (or would) the aliens resolve this conflict? Whatever you decide, make sure it’s consistent with the nature of your aliens…which means you need to understand their basic nature well. One additional point: choose a specific person (in my case, a specific Amphib) to carry and personalize the story. This makes it easier to use all your bag of storytelling tricks. 4. How do your aliens interact with humans? Again, pick a specific person to bring this interaction right down to the personal, emotional level. Your readers will find it easier to identify with actual individuals who embody the conflicts and tensions inherent in your story. 5. Pay attention to the basic science (or biology) of your aliens. The Seomish people are marine, water-breathing people. Think dolphin-like people. As the name suggests, Amphibs can live on land or in the water. Because of these basic facts, I’ve had to make numerous allowances to be able to advance the story. For example, how would intelligent, fish-like people move about on land, when the story requires it? I solved this problem by having the Seomish develop something I call a mobilitor, a sort of enclosed exoskeleton that encapsulates a Seomish water-breather and gives them decent mobility on the land. When I found it necessary in the story for the Seomish to be able to move about on land, I couldn’t just ignore their marine origins. I had to give them a technological solution. Creating believable aliens can be demanding and rewarding, because it gives you as the author a way to comment on humans and the human condition in a unique way. I hope this rather long blog post will help you in any similar future endeavors. The next post to The Word Shed comes on August 31. See you then. Phil B.