The world-building community released a prompt yesterday which asks us about evolution and how it is understood in our world, which has given me a big buzz because only a few days ago I was working through some ideas for one of the alien races in my world and I wanted a chance to write about them.
Here's A Link To The Prompt, If You Would Like To Get Involved.
The Rotchi
They are described as bug-like creatures, kind of like a cross between a fly, a human, and a praying mantis. They are coated all over their body with small fine black hairs, their eyes are huge and mirrored with hundreds of small eyes, they have mandibles which chitter, two sets of arms, their bipedal and they have wings, meaning they can fly, but the wings are also used to communicate in their native language; which is mainly buzzing, chitters and mostly non-verbal. However, in their recent history, of a few hundred years, they have adapted to speaking verbally.
Also, since they were one of the only Free Space worlds who joined The Confederation, most of the Rotchi who joined decided to chop their wings off, as they felt alienated because of them since the average Confederation troop felt uncomfortable about having them on board. However, it wasn't their wings that made them feel uncomfortable; it was the Rotchi in general.
In chopping their wings off and becoming "normal" a branch of them became alienated from their own kind and anyone who did become more docile because the wings of a Rotchi produced its testosterone, or, their equivalent of it.
After the invasion ended, the Rotchi homeworld of Rotchnok was invaded by the now homeless Triskens, who had their planet destroyed by Rotchi-made weaponry; the world is now known as New Trisk, and everything the Rotchi owned is now owned by the Triskens, who have formed many crime syndicates and utilise the Rotchi's short life span, and they also take advantage of the Rotchi's fast reproduction speed. They have become such a nuisance that the government of Jex put out the order that the Peacekeepers should just kill them on site if they break the law, as detaining them isn't worth it, since they only live for about 5 or 6 years. Also, they are unquestionably loyal to their bosses and refuse to speak when they are captured.
After their homeworld was taken over by the Triskens their alliance with The Confederation ended and they sent no support for their previous allies. Some Rotchi enclaves still live in Confederation space, but they are few and far between. The Rotchi had no choice but to ****endure the abuse they receive from the rest of Free Space, even though, from the time of the invasion until the current date in the story, there have been three generations of Rotchi, so every one of them currently alive is long removed from the events of the invasion.
Disconnected Hive Species
The Rotchi used to be a Hive species, they would have a queen and brood maids who reproduced, there were warrior classes, worker classes, and fodder classes.
The fodder classes were used in their tens of thousands to swarm enemy nests thousands of years ago before the warrior classes would escort brood maids in to repopulate the nest. Each brood maid was a clone of the queen and eventually, one queen ruled their entire world. This is where the deviation happened which formed the Rotchi as we know them now.
As the population of the Rotchi swelled, the queens of every nest had the same thought. "Break their connection with the weakest of the brood."
This prompted them to exile Rotchi who for any reason at all was different, maybe they didn't follow orders, or maybe they had some kind of mutation. The end result was more and more Rotchi were sent to the surface of Rotchnok.
While on the surface, they evolved without a connection to the queens, they were met by visitors at some point, and technology was exchanged. The population continued to boom, without the queen's knowledge; it turned out, that the exile would end up hurting the queens of the nests. As these disconnected Rotchi started putting their minds to work and some started to leave the planet.
By the time the queens realised this it was almost too late; war took place, and soon, the disconnected Rotchi started to exterminate nests, to make way for their own works, unharmed by the animalistic Hive minds that lived far below the surface.
The Queen, knowing the writing was on the wall is said to have fled, far deeper than they ever had before, and now, they haven't been seen or heard of since the war for Rotchnok, hundreds of years ago.
Rotchi Scientists
The ones that won their world, the exiled Rotchi were left on a planet of their own, and they put all of their efforts into scientific research. Everything from weapons to air purifiers, they even started to terraform their world, turning it from the dark and gloomy place it was, into a fertile green wasteland. The Rotchi hated it, and then they had to reverse to strides they made, which ended up polluting the world and making it much worse than it was. But, weirdly, they actually preferred it; it did, however, stop any other people from moving to Rotchnok, which to them was a good thing.
The Triskens made it work for them when they moved in and took over, the Triskens came from a swamp world, so it didn't bother them much. But, many Rotchi lived in underground cities, and the surface was used mostly by the Triskens.