The Limners (species Malacolimner stellae) are Lobster-like Crustacean aliens that have been found on three isolated star systems in the hinterlands beyond the Monkey head Nebula (counterspinwise of the Perseus rift).
Biology[]
The Limners are a group of dog-sized, superficially Lobster-like crustacean Alien creatures.
Despite cultural and phenotypic differences among the three races (known usually as Limner A, B, and C) the obvious genotypes and memetotypes are the same. Molecular phylogenetics shows that they evolved from a common starfaring ancestor some 30,000 years ago. The fact that all Limners have symbiotic bionanites in their neural ganglia show that the original species was provolved by members of an earlier race known as Auld Limner, whose domain extended across many hundred light years, well into the Perseus arm and beyond. Many xenoarchaeologists in the current era believe that the Auld Limners were themselves provolved by the still-current race known as the Soft Ones, who also think that this may be the case (although they have no definite proof either).
History[]
The systems where these creatures inhabit had all been mapped and named by Metasoft telescopic surveys, but Orion Federation exploration ships actually got there first. The three systems are some 100 to 200 light years apart. Each planet shows definite signs of being terraformed, so are probably not the homeworlds of these creatures.
All are warm, wet worlds with an oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere that differs from typical lifebearing Gaian type worlds in having significant traces of methane, which is constantly replenished by biological processes.