The Sororians are a humanoid race from the planet Soror, in the Betelgeuse system.
Biology[]
The Sororians are indistinguishable from humans from Earth, though they possess golden skin and are physically fit, handsome specimens of humanity. Their kind's time in the wild jungles of Soror have made Sororians prime athletic creatures. With strong bodies that have skin that is resistant to sharp foliage that would normally leave scratches on normal humans, allowing to travel through dense jungle with impunity.
Sororian are omnivores subsisting on wild fruits like bananas and deer. Their diet being most likely due to their arboreal environment. Thanks to that they are expert climbers, able to easily scale trees and cliffs with their bare hands and legs. Sororians appear to be also strong creatures, as some have shown to be capable of hunting wild game utilizing no form of tools save only their blunt teeth, sharp nails and even thighs to kill other animals. Sororians being taller and stronger, are as deadly at killing the current dominant species of Soror, apes, with even a female easily strangling a chimpanzee to death with relative ease. The only ape species that appear to be able to match a Sororian in strength are gorillas, due to their burly build, though it would take two to at least overpower one physically.
While being terrestrial creatures, Sororians appear to be capable swimmers, thanks to the presence of shallow pools of water near their colonies. Though appear to be limited to the dog paddle. Despite evolving on two different worlds, humans and Sororians are compatible in producing viable offspring.
Oddly for all their physical superior characteristics, Sororians are dismal in mental computation. Having poor critical thinking skills, articulation and coordination. Another unique characteristic possessed by the Sororians was a genetic collective memory of the species. Through an experiment involving a combination of physico-chemical processes, and electrical impulses it was discovered that the Sororians could recollect not only their own memories but also atavistic memories from their distant line of ancestors, going back thousands of years.
However due to the cerebral regression of modern day Sororians leaving them possessing bestial minds, individuals who are subjected to the experiment result in imperfect recollections and function more akin to gramophone or parrots. Such recollections are limited to snatches of words they heard during captivity. In one example it appears that female Sororians have better results as they not only can articulate their own past memories, but their ancestral memories with perfect clarity.
History[]
Over ten thousand years ago, Sororians were a humanoid civilization similar to twentieth century Earth. The Sororians were a society of medical practitioners, employing apes in their culture as pets, servants, and lab animals.
Over the centuries the apes soon began to develop mentally whereas the Sororians began to suffer a cerebral regression.
This evolutionary advantage allowed the apes to slowly take over Sororian civilization. Men and women that remained in the cities soon had their roles as masters reversed as pets or animals.
Since their ancestors lost their place as Soror’s dominant race, the Sororians have been reduced to savage, naked animals, living in the wilds.
The memory of the ancient Sororian civilization was eventually lost to time by the apes. With their innate characteristics of mimicry, the apes reproduced the Sororians cultural works and sciences as their own. And while the apes seamlessly duplicated all aspects of the Sororians achievements, the new ape society suffered a slow technological growth due to their slow reaction to change and adherence to repeating the copied works of their predecessors.
Culture[]
Ancient Sororian society civilization was a post-industrial society geared towards medical sciences. There is evidence of a Women's Journal suggesting that Sororian society was at least men dominated or patriarchally but possessed a budding women's rights movement which was present when the apes began to achieve sentience.
Based on the cultural aspects of the apes, which are just vestiges of Sororian arts that they mastered, Sororians possessed various forms of art. They developed techniques for classical paintings, portraits of celebrities, country scenes, etc. They also depicted the female form in their artwork alongside their own version of Cupid, which was later readapted by the apes into a winged monkey. Sororians may have just started out developing impressionist art as well as contemporary art as there are few examples of reproductions done by the simian inheritors.
Sports that Sororians participated in include a form of European football as well as boxing matches. For the latter though the sport adapted by the gorillas to include springboards to launch themselves at their opponent in midair.
In contrast modern Sororian society, however has regressed and resemble gorilla colonies of Earth. They have a fierce hatred for the apes, and any articles (clothes, emotions, etc.) associated to civilization due to millennia of conditioning as animals. They appear to be more adjusted to the outdoor environment in their natural state, although this could also be due to the equatorial environment of Soror with high temperatures 77 degrees Fahrenheit, thus making clothing unnecessary in order to stay cool during the day. During the night, the Sororians, lacking fire, rely on body heat and curl against their mates and children for warmth.
Endangerment[]
Originally the Sororians had outnumbered the ape population but is falling in decline due to over-hunting by the gorilla clan for sport. Sororians are a valuable animal that fetches a high price on the market as they play an intricate part in medical sciences conducted by the apes. However the capture of specimens has allowed horrific slaughter on innocent men and women for entertainment by the gorillas.
Beside their corpses being used as trophies, human hair is prized as a trophy, similar to the feathers of a rare bird. As an bizarre form of plume hunting, the locks of the best specimens, particularly women, are taken to decorate the hats of female apes.
Intelligence[]
The Sororians have regressed into a semi-sapient state, and are potentially capable of becoming rational creatures once again. There is evidence found by the apes that the Sororians attempted to relearn tool use, and failed. However the men of Soror's failure to regain their status as intelligent beings has been attributed to the interference by the apes through not only territorial encroachment and over-hunting, but also through the abuse of their medical sciences. Some Sororians under proper instruction could possibly achieve status as civilized beings.
Mating Habits[]
Sororians are monogamous, though officiating such a union requires an arduous courtship ritual like birds. The male engages in a sort of slow, hesitant dance consisting of steps forward, backward, and sideways. He moved thus in an ever-decreasing circle, a circle whose center was occupied by the woman, who merely pivoted around without shifting from her position awaiting copulation that concluded these preliminaries.
Appearances[]
- La Planète des Singes, by Pierre Boulle (1963)