Board Thread:Custom Lore Development/@comment-26084195-20161007012748

Ok, some of you guys wanted me to tell this particular story.

The Harpies of Drochar III

Drochar III: a thoroughly unimpressive planet by outside appearance, orbiting a binary star system. It has large rings, and shares its system with no less than five asteroid belts and small rocky planets of low interest. The world was marked by the Terran Alliance for potential colonization, but was ignored for a while due to better or more pressing options, or due to combat. When eventually the Terran Alliance did attempt to head over there, they were countered by a Razorbird fleet patrolling the edges of Alliance territory.

It was a while before the Terran Alliance took another stab at Drochar. They immediately made to check out the only planet in the goldilocks zone of the system. Upon arrival, they discovered that, despite the lack of plant life, there were sentient beings living amongst the vast geologic wonders of the world. And they were surprised at what they found.

They found an alien race, but one that was amazingly familiar. They were human. Or, mostly human. If you gave a human the legs of a bird, bird wings instead of arms, feathers along most of the back, bird eyes, and a beak. They were too similar to the Harpies of old Terran legend to be a coincidence. They seemed to survive by roosting on sea cliffs and hunting exotic sea life in the oceans.

The Terran Alliance did not have much of a chance to examine this world, however, as they quickly discovered that the inhabitants were hostile. Though the Harpies were indeed tribal and incapable of harming the Alliance legionnaires, the Alliance retreated anyway. By Alliance law and Galactic Council law alike it was illegal to interfere with the development of a young species.

The reason for the hostility of the Harpies, however, was not as expected. The truth of their very existence lies with the Directorate.

Ah, the Directorate. Yeah, the union of Terran corporations that split off from the Alliance and left the Milky Way to be free of the restrictions of paltry things like law which prevent maximum profit. They are amoral and unempathic, and unfortunately bear frightening technologies born of their R&D department. But we’re not here to talk about them.

They decided to do a little experiment. Everyone knows that the greatest conflict in the Milky Way is that between the Razorbird Empire and the Terran Alliance. So the Directorate figured “Why not combine a Razorbird and a pureblooded Terran?” Exactly, why?

Well, because they can.

So they abducted hundreds of pureblooded Terrans and abducted just as many Razorbirds (though the latter was significantly harder). They began to perform gene splicing experiments. The eventual result was the Harpies.

The Directorate then began an ongoing experiment, wherein they placed the Harpies on a chosen planet for observation. The Directorate established cloaked observation posts in orbit and observed for almost a century.

But such is the nature of being half Razorbird that the song of Jiral resonated loudly within their souls. And this resonance, coupled with visions, guided the chosen children of Jiral to Drochar III. They arrived only a few solar days after the Terran Alliance made planetfall.

The Harpies immediately embraced the Razorbirds, with whom they shared a common native tongue. The bond between the two were cemented nearly from the get-go, as the Harpies swiftly established worship of Jiral. The Razorbirds called in support to hasten the transformation of the Harpies from a tribal race to a fully developed starfaring species.

Naturally, this was an issue for the Alliance, who didn’t want their enemies to gain an ally right on their border, and immediately mobilized a fleet to attack Drochar III and hopefully liberate the Harpies, which after careful examination they recognized as part human.

And of course, this outside interference was a big issue for the Directorate, who deployed a fleet immediately to protect their assets in the area.

Thus, the Drochar system went from empty to the site of a three way battle between the tenacious and numerous Alliance, the devoted and hyper-advanced Razorbirds, and the amoral and cunning Directorate.

The red laser beams of the Alliance streaked out at every sector of battle. The powerful particle lances of the Imperial navy made the hulls of vessels shriek as they ripped apart. And the Directorate corporate security fleets winked in and out of view, blasting out blinding rays of plasma and overriding enemy systems with highly aggressive AI.

Despite the best efforts of the Razorbirds the battle did eventually reach the surface of Drochar III. Fortunately this stage of the battle was blissfully short. The arcane teleportation technology wielded by the Razorbirds, a device incapable of being replicated by anyone yet encountered gave them a substantial advantage over the marines of the opposition, and they winked in and out of battle in pulses of green light. The Harpies would have aided them, if they had weaponry to contribute.

The stellar battle, though far more heated and devastating than the one on the ground, did reach a decisive ending with the arrival of the ISS (Imperial Star Ship) Emerald Faith arrived. The Emerald Faith was a Razorbird supercarrier, and immediately flung swarms of Razorbird bombers into the battle, blotting out the very stars. The Terran Alliance swiftly broke from the battle and retreated, deciding that the planet was not worth the loss of their entire fleet. This left only the Directorate fleet, who didn’t fight much longer. It was either salvage what was left or risk losing all their assets.

While the Alliance felt sorry for their half brethren, for fear that the Razorbirds would warp and repress them to fit their twisted ends, this would not be the case. In fact, the Razorbird Empire treated Drochar III as a protective older sibling. The church labeled Drochar III as a paradise world. Though it’s true that Drochar had no plant life beyond the ocean floor, the geologic formations of its surface were truly stunning, and the sapphire oceans only served to highlight them. The crust was also rich in many valuable gems, which were valuable to the priests and other high ranking among the Razorbirds.

And so the Harpies were uplifted, taught advanced science and given technology to help them overcome their lack of fingers. Though technically not a part of the empire, the Harpies of Drochar III share a bond of friendship, brotherhood, and even love in some cases with the Razorbirds. 