Kitonak

The Kitonak, are pudgy, slow-moving sapients from the harsh Kitonak Desert which covers the planet Kirdo III. Their physiology is an adaptation to their life as desert nomads, while their psychology is notable for their extreme patience and calm. They are also noted for their talent as musicians.

Biology and appearance
Kitonaks are small and stocky creatures, with two legs ending in large, didactyl feet, and two arms with tridactyl hands. Their skin color varies from off-white to pinkish Though their fingers are short and fat, they are quite dexterous. Their bodies release a vanilla-like smell.

Kitonaks have tough skin which fold to seal vulnerable openings, a trait evolved to protect them from the harsh environment of Kirdo III's deserts. They also have some double organs, including two pairs of lungs. Their double lungs can store oxygen, allowing them to hold their breath for up to four hours. Their ears, eyes, and mouth can be sealed, and are almost too small for the casual observer to see. Kitonaks move slowly, as they walk by expanding and contracting their foot muscles, or slither slowly in a prone position. Their strong feet anchor them during windstorms, while they lean into the wind with their aerodynamically shaped bodies and heads. In worse storms, when rocks began to fly, they burrow into the dunes. Their sense of smell is also centered in olfactory organs in their feet, allowing them to smell their prey through the sands without having to worry about the desert winds.

Kitonaks are very patient, and never rushed. This is because they feed on creatures called chooba, and they have to stand motionless for a long time until a chooba gets near them. The nearsighted chooba mistakes motionless Kitonaks for sulfaro plants, which chooba often raid in search of fruit or bird eggs. One chooba satisfies a Kitonak's dietary needs for approximately one month.

Society and culture
Kitonak live in nomadic tribes of about one hundred Kitonaks, following migrating chooba herds. Due to their nomadic lifestyle and the tendency for what possessions they have to blow away in windstorms, Kitonak technology is limited to crude, temporary tools and musical instruments. Their tribes are united in a planet-wide participatory democracy, though slow communications and their deliberate thought processes mean that years will pass before decisions are made (by which time, the problem will often have solved itself.)

The "Telling of the Story" is the highlight of a Kitonak tribe's day. Each night, the members of the tribe will take turns at storytelling, which each Kitonak adding his or her own details and plot twists. A single story can take several nights to come to a conclusion. These stories teach young Kitonak the value of patience.

Rain comes to their home once every ten years. When this happens, Kitonaks go to the newly full riverbeds for the "Great Celebration of Life," plunging into the riverbeds for the "Dance of Love." At the end of this mating ritual, females will emerge with newborn children. Though this makes it seem that Kitonaks have an extremely short gestation period, the opposite is the case: these children are actually conceived years earlier during the previous rainy period's celebration. Young Kitonaks clung close to their mother for the first year of life, eventually becoming strong enough to stand on their own even during windstorms.

By the age of nine, Kitonak reach full maturity. More adventurous nine-year-olds will leave overpopulated tribes to wander the desert in search of less crowded tribes. These lonely nomads will often make crude chidinkalu flutes from chidinka plants, and play them to while away the nights and attract other Kitonaks.

Psychology
Kitonaks are almost always calm and patient, refusing to take action without considering the consequences carefully. In fact, their typical course of action will be to do nothing. Even among Humans or other, "faster-paced" aliens, Kitonaks are painfully slow to answer questions or make decisions. One of the only things to anger them is being hurried. They often will slow down out of spite if someone is making them rush.

The only other things which upset them are quicksands and caves. Caves are believed to be gateways to their mythological underworld, and it is said that no Kitonak returns from them. Quicksands, on the other hand, are a more tangible danger on their homeworld, since predatory creatures able to swallow a Kitonak whole lurk within. A Kitonak stuck in quicksand will easily be able to wait patiently until help comes without falling further in — but help will usually be slow to arrive.

Sample Kitonak names
Most Kitonaks went by a single, simple name. Typical names include: Anarin, Enkor, Gorlak, Nert, Norzek, Rufar, Runk and Werg. One of the best-known Kitonaks adopted the name "Droopy McCool" after abandoning his former name, "Snit." However, Snit was simply the name his former master Evar Orbus gave him. McCool's true name was a series of whistles which was incomprehensible to most non-Kitonaks. Other recorded Kitonak names may have had similar origins.

Kitonaks in the galaxy
Kitonaks will sometimes be abducted by off-world slave traders. Usually, these are young Kitonaks on their own for the first time, playing their flutes to attract company. Since the slavers are often initially attracted by a Kitonak's music, they will force them to work as jizz wailers in seedy cantinas. Kitonaks enslaved as laborers usually infuriate their masters by working slowly, and are often freed to work as musicians. Their former masters will take their wages until their slave-debt is repaid. (Of course, harsher masters will sometimes kill their Kitonak slaves.)

Some free Kitonak musicians, such as Droopy McCool of the Max Rebo Band, became fairly successful, particularly in the jizz and ontechii genres. Other free Kitonaks use their storytelling skills, patience, and the tendency of other beings to think an unmoving Kitonak was asleep or even non-sapient, to become spies and information brokers. Their clients have to learn to be patient, and let them reveal their information slowly and carefully. Some free Kitonak have considered going back to Kirdo III to give their people advanced technology and drive off the slavers, but it took a long time for such Kitonaks to decide to do anything about it.

Several Kitonaks served as Palace Overlords for Fa'athra the Hutt on the planet Nal Hutta during the Cold War.

During the Galactic Civil War, a few Kitonaks even joined the Rebel Alliance. Terno, a musician and Rebel agent operating in the Minos Cluster, was one such Kitonak. During this period, the Imperial slang term for the Kitonaks was "Yazbo".

Around 35 ABY, a Kitonak trained to be a Jedi in the New Jedi Order.

[[Category:Tribal Races])