#volucrus anax

[dein0nychus]

funny cranial ornamentation meetup! 

ft. A yet to be shown wyvern character, Zinnia, and a crown, a species by @charseraph!

[dein0nychus]

siggy give me as much wyvern info as possible

ENABLER!!!!

-Wyverns is invertebrates. They have a lobster-like shell-skeleton-thing beneath their skin that keeps their shape and protects their organs. Their beaks and resonating chambers are coated in keratin to reinforce them. Its much more "Wyvern-shaped" than Earth vertebrate skeletons.

-Wyverns don't have feathers, but rather coarse "hairs" like insects. The hairs are very thick (some individuals acclimated to colder climates can have up to 10 hairs per follicle, but its usually 1 or 2) and stiff. Touching a Wyvern feels like running your hand over a soft-bristle hairbrush. They usually range from 1-4 inches in length and stand straight up and away from the body, but sometimes can be longer and/or "shaggier."

-They come in lots of colors, from purples and blues to reds and oranges! Their color runs down to their skin, so a hairless Wyvern would still retain their color and pattern. Colors are genetic and related clanmates usually share similar colors, inherited from their parents. Brighter colors are considered more attractive, with the exception of pink. Pink wyverns are a form of hypopigmentation where the skin and hairs don't fully develop normal color, so they appear varying shades of pink depending on the levels of pigment in their skin. Rikki is a good example of a hypopigmented Wyvern- he retains some red pigment but is mostly pinkish in color. Pink is often used as an alarm or threat color, as their blood is magenta.

-Wyverns have a bisex system, but it doesn't quite work the same way ours does. One sex can only reproduce sexually with another Wyvern, while the other can reproduce parthenogenically (asexually) as well as sexually. There is no sexual dimorphism between the two. Exclusively sexual reproducers can mate either with the opposite sex or with each other (hence why I hesitate to call the sexes "male" and "female." The closest analogue here on Earth that I can find is gynodioecy, where females and hermaphrodites coexist, with the asexual reproducers being the "females" in this scenario. Confusing, I know. This is also totally prone to retcons as I'm not sold on it yet.)

In line with reproductive stuff while keeping it as SFW as possible, Wyverns are sort of marsupial-like in young development. They form a marsupium (a sort of weird external sack to hold developing offspring in. Isopods do it, its totally cool and weird) on their abdomen, where the offspring develop for a few months before they break out as little scraggly cotton balls called whelps. The whelps can't walk on their own, and are totally dependent on their parents for the first few years of their lives. They can eat solid food from birth but depend on their parents (and other adults in the clan) to carry them around, feed them, and protect them until they're old enough to start flying and their wings get strong enough to walk on. As soon as they're fully flighted, they're considered adults in the way of becoming a full-fledged clan member, but don't become fully physically mature until they're about 20, when their resonating chamber starts to grow out into its full display structure (which takes another year or so to finish.)

That's all I got off the top of my head without further prompting atm!

[dein0nychus]

also i drew alyx and gordon as wyverns yesterday. enjoy

[dein0nychus]

HOW LONG DO THEY LOVE? DO THEY HAVE A CONCEPT OF GENDER?

Wyverns (just to clear things up, when I make a generalization about the species, I mean particularly your average, homeplanet-raised Wyvern/Basilisk) don't really have an idea of exclusive, monogamous love. Romantic partners are usually together for a while, then part ways, may come back together again and may not. A Wyvern may have any number of partners for really any length of time. Romantic love isn't really viewed as like, the highest form of love in the way that a lot of Western cultures we might be familiar with regard it as. Romance is just another way to have a relationship with a person for a while. Wyverns tend to disappoint human partners looking for a long-term commitment, as the idea of committing to one, exclusive romance their entire life tends to be foreign to them.

Gender is... pretty non-existent. It doesn't really matter to them. The only time anyone is really thinking about that kind of thing is when reproduction comes to mind, and even then it isn't a huge deal since their sexes are wacky. It seems especially odd to them that someone would be barred from presenting themselves a certain way because of societal expectations of what their sex is supposed to be.

[dein0nychus]

Nasitsce, an immigrant from the Wyvern home planet dedicated to preserving their culture and language on Earth and a high school Tuoka teacher, and his fellow educator Rikki, a much younger Wyvern more happy to assimilate with humans.

[dein0nychus]

What kinds of foods do Wyverns enjoy?

They're primarily insectivores! A common, easy snack is small roasted invertebrates flavored with any wide variety of spices. Wyverns can taste capsaicin like humans can, and many tend to enjoy spicy things!

On Earth, Wyverns are the most common market for edible insects, but they also tend to enjoy seafood like crab, lobster, shrimp, etc. Their jaws are built for crushing invertebrate shells, so they usually don't bother with meticulously taking it apart to eat and will usually just crunch the whole thing. They tolerate human food very well, without many adverse reactions, so they can enjoy most things humans do as well. No chocolate, though.

Basilisks, for the most part, aren't particularly picky eaters. Its both a biological and cultural thing- very few things will actually hurt them in terms of adverse reactions, and Basilisk cultures place a large emphasis on being grateful for whatever food is available.

[dein0nychus]

tumblr dash slow at work. send asks about wyverns/basilisks

[dein0nychus]

wyvern whelp behavior

[dein0nychus]

How did the humans and the Wyverns / Basilisks met?

Humans and Wyverns made first contact with each other during a small manned exploration mission to the Wyvern homeworld, Injeseh (pronounced in-jess-uh, a small habitable moon orbiting a gas giant a la Pandora.) The sort of overarching setting that the Wyverns exist in takes place in the near-ish future (2070s-2100s range, I don't have specific dates yet <_<,) so humans have developed FTL travel to explore far-off worlds like Injeseh.

The exploratory mission was launched by NASA and manned by a small crew including the two trained off-planet astronauts that did the contacting. Neither of them (obviously) spoke Tuoka, the Wyvern language, but both the Wyverns they met and themselves spoke a W'tich language (spoken by the R'rwyri, who humans had contacted many years prior.) The human crew spent 3 months on Injeseh with a Wyvern clan before leaving, bringing two Wyverns named Hatze and Isa with them back home.

Wyverns, being social as they are, almost immediately forged a good relationship with various human space organizations around the world and on Venus and Mars (colonies which I have yet to do any worldbuilding for LOL.) Wyverns started hitching rides to Earth, Venus, and Mars and set up on Earth. Humans and Wyverns have remarkably similar dietary needs and Wyverns can breathe comfortably in Earth's atmosphere, so they fit right in in a biological sense. Socially it took a bit longer for Human and Wyvern cultures to mingle.

[dein0nychus]

Oh! I forgot about the wyverns! have you talked about their diets before? two specific questions, Is their diet very restricted, or can they have a wide range of foods? Also, are there any species-wide unusual meals?

I think I've talked briefly about diets!

Wyverns are omnivorous and tolerant of a lot of the toxins common prey species on their planet have developed. The bulk of their diet is made up of small-medium sized invertebrates, which are usually eaten whole (sort of like we eat lobsters) and raw or seared (to make them brittle and crunchy instead of just hard to bite into.) They also eat a variety of fruits and plant materials, but its not a HUGE part of their diets. I'd consider raw bugs pretty unusual!

Basilisks are obligate carnivores and need at least 70% meat in their diet. They're largely scavengers, eating carrion and decomposing material, but some communities follow prey species or farm them for easier access to meat. They can eat pretty much anything that isn't inherently toxic to them- they're basically natural garbage disposals that will eat anything from well-cooked and seasoned meat to the internal shell "bones" of whatever died on the surface of the planet last. Basilisks have a near-universal cultural idea that food is a commodity that one should be thankful for no matter what it is, so generally any food is good food to someone raised by Basilisks.

[dein0nychus]

tell me all about wyverns in the hl setting. are the characters all wyverns? how does the general enviroment\story changes?

The general story stays the same. Wyverns and Basilisks have had their home planet ransacked by the Combine. Most are separated from their clans and shipped off to other worlds to do whatever work they're suited for until they die. The Combine are not fans of Wyverns and have complete extermination in mind for them- they're far too stubbornly social and kind by nature to be of much use. Basilisks are more their speed- a lot of them get turned into synths or otherwise recruited as soldiers.

In my brain Gordon and Alyx are Wyverns, Barney is a basilisk maybe, and Adrian is a basilisk/wyvern hybrid (possible but very rare! The size and mass difference between the two poses. como se dice. challenges.) Alyx was raised by Eli and Azian, who are humans, so she behaves more like a human and stands upright like one, she doesn't speak the Wyvern language, etc. Gordon is Wyvern-raised by a very traditional clan, and he speaks mostly Tuoka and very little English. He and Alyx have trouble communicating- Alyx tends to just talk at him and he nods along without understanding her all that much. Barney is a sort of middle ground- raised by Basilisks but good around humans. He has a tendency to intimidate because he's a large (8' at the top of his head, not including his crest) obligate carnivore, but Basilisks are obligate scavengers so he's basically just an overgrown horse that doubles as a living garbage disposal. He has poor eyesight from being forced to work during the day, where the bright light caused damage to his light-sensitive eyes.

Wyverns (usually called birdbugs by the very creative humans) on post-Combine Earth usually have their wings "clipped-" they have their wing fingers/fore and hind wings amputated to keep them from escaping Combine-controlled areas. Basilisks usually get their wings clipped too despite being relatively poor fliers. None of the protagonists have wings except for Gordon. Certain workers and soldiers (Wyvern soldiers are usually recruited against their will- snatched from their clans and memory wiped/transhuman'd forcibly) get to keep theirs, but they have an implant similar to a house arrest anklet that prevents them from getting too far away.

Wyverns are common amongst the resistance! They'll go out of their way to help people wherever they can. Dewinged rebel Wyverns make up for their lack of flight with a 9-foot vertical leap and a surprising aptitude for submachine guns.

[dein0nychus]

Oh id love to hear more about your wyvrens, they're so interesting, i love that they're crustacean

HELL YEAG!!!!!!!

Their "shell" is right under their skin and all their musculature anchors to the underside. They can sustain injuries that expose their shell because all the important stuff is on the inside, but exposure leaves it more prone to breakage, which is where the real serious issues start to arise. Broken shell pieces can be repaired a lot like human bones can and the operations to do so tend to be way less invasive since its literally just skin deep. Wyvern shell that's not covered with keratin (like the vocal chamber and the beak) is pearlescent!

Wyvern lungs are in their necks so most "headgear" like protective helmets are actually neck gear. I haven't decided where their brain goes yet (or if they have a central brain or not at all 👀) but most of their head is dedicated to their complex vocal structures and eyeballs/nose/mouth. Injuries to the vocal chamber are treated very seriously because if it gets infected it can lead to what's colloquially known as "mad bird disease," (i'm workshopping the actual name) which is an inflammation of the neural tissue caused by infections to structures in the head that can often lead to altered behavior (lethargy, confusion, memory loss, and aggression among other things.)

Wyvern culture doesn't really have a taboo against nudity! Its just as common to see a homeplanet wyvern chilling out with nothing on as it is to see one clothed. Clothing is more for looking pretty and sometimes social signaling. Immigrants to areas where clothes are the norm and nudity is frowned upon tend to be confused by the idea. Common clothing items are usually just simple capes or hoods, but most clothing companies make more human-style clothes fitted for Wyverns.

Wyvern clans will READILY adopt anyone that endears themself to a member. Clans are family units and if you're a friend, a partner, a spouse, a loose acquaintance, or someone that a clan member had a friendly conversation with once, you had best be ready to be part of the family! Wyvern clans can fill whole floors of apartments with how expansive they get. Wyverns are also ready sharers- if you're hungry, they'll feed you. Need a place to stay? We have a spare room! Need anything? Take it, its yours for as long as you need it! Property is usually communal and shared, and they carry this idea wherever they go.

[dein0nychus]

moar wyvern stuff!! ft. their sister species, basilisks :)

[dein0nychus]

wyvern anatomical wackiness ft. Head Lungs and weird pupils

[dein0nychus]

Do your wyverns eat soup? If they do what kind of soups do they enjoy?

Soup came with human contact! They enjoy it and even find it a little novel/exotic, but some clans are more willing to adopt it into their diets than others. The Nuka-Atguet clan are a soup-lovin' folk. They'll sometimes put their own spin on it (spicy soft invertebrate bits in imported Earth bone broth is a favorite) but what's popular in the human cultures they have the most contact with is what's popular with them.