The Krai

Overview

The Krai Empire covers many hundred worlds and is one of the three major powers in this galactic quadrant. The empire is dominated by a single race, the Krai and encompasses a number of subjugated slave races. The Krai are descended from carnivorous pack animals. They are militaristic, aggressive, and fiercely territorial.

The Krai have been involved in a decades-long "cold war" with both of the other major galactic powers in the quadrant, the Kingdom of High Ilona and the Emissariate of Bolusca. Earth lies at the point where the three territories meet and is considered a neutral system.

History

The Krai race evolved from the apex predators on their home world, attaining an intelligent civilization at roughly the same time as the civilization of Atlantis arose on Earth.

Due to their natural tendency to form packs united under strong leaders, democracy and equality was unknown on the Krai homeworld. Instead, a succession of powerful leaders, styled "emperors", united the entire Krai race, leading to a period of comparative peace and prosperity during which they advanced technologically at a far greater rate than humans on Earth. The Krai's drive towards combat caused them to seek enemies, however, and as soon as they developed an effective interstellar drive (at a time roughly equivalent to the early Egyptian era on Earth) they spread out and conquered neighbouring worlds, only halting when they encountered the equally advanced Boluscans. Many bloody wars were fought with the Boluscans, and later the High Ilonans, and this served to curtail their otherwise unopposed expansion throughout the galaxy.

Political Organisation

The Krai are organised as a united species under one all-powerful and unquestioned emperor. Beneath the emperor, society is organised into a strict, hierarchical caste system. Highest are the "captains", and below them are castes of workers and warriors. The lower castes are referred to as "drones" and have very limited capacity for personal thought. This subservient nature appears to be genetically driven. It is not connected to intelligence, as low-caste scientists or technicians can be highly intelligent or skilled in their fields and yet still unquestioningly subservient to a captain's orders. There have been exceptions to this hierarchy, perhaps genetic aberrations, but they are few and far between (and form the basis of lower-caste legends: every drone perhaps dreams of being one of the rare exceptions who can raise his caste).

Physiology

In appearance, the Krai most resemble human-sized bipedal wolves. The average height and weight for a Krai warrior drone is 178cm (5'10") and 120kg (265 lbs) and there is very little variation from this mean. Captains are larger by up to 30cm and 20kg (12" and 44 lbs) and show greater variation between individuals.

Krai are covered in a thick pelt of straight hair, generally black-brown for a drone but with some variation among captains. This hide serves a protective function. Its thickness protects the Krai from injury and also insulates against extremes of temperature.

The palms, finger tips, and base of the feet are free from hair and covered in leathery pads. Krai possess four fingers and an opposable thumb. Their feet have four toes, with a vestigial dewclaw. The nails on both fingers and toes are elongated into blunt claws. These claws are partly, but not fully, retractable. The thumb claw is often surgically removed in drones to facilitate tool use.

The upper and lower jaws protrude into a rounded muzzle with 28 teeth: six prominent incisors and eight molars in each jaw.

The ears, placed high on the side of the head, are rounded and covered in hair. Human and Krai ears are anatomically identical, internally. The Krai's senses of hearing and smell are slightly superior to a human's, and their eyesight slightly worse. Millennia in a technological society have caused their senses to atrophy to a level below that which their primitive ancestors would have possessed.

The Krai skeleton consists of 202 bones. The primary skeletal differences between Human and Krai are in the foot and the vertebrae. The Krai foot developed only four toes, plus a vestigial dewclaw. Thus each foot contains 25 bones (nine bones of the tarsus, four metatarsal bones, and twelve phalanges). The Krai spine possesses three lumbar vertebrae, two less than a Human.

Relatively longer humorous and femur bones compensate for the shorter spine to give the Krai approximate human height.

The greater load-bearing characteristics of the Krai spine give the Krai drone 10%-20% greater carrying strength than a Human of comparable size. Krai Captains tend to be stronger still, but show much more individual variation.

The biochemistry of humans and Krai is very similar, and though the Krai are carnivorous by preference their actual nature is omnivorous.

The Krai on Earth

The Krai considered Earth an interdicted world, off-limits to all of the Empire's ships. The reason for this may lie in their past encounters with humans.

It is known that the Krai have visited Earth a number of times over its history. Documented evidence exists for visits in 1450 B.C.E., the 1940s, and the 1980s. There may have been other visits as yet undocumented.

In 2014, a group of shape-changing human/wolf creatures are in the service of the United States military. It is assumed that these are in some way connected to the Krai but as yet the connection has not been revealed.

Notable Individuals

• Captain Korrett (captained the battlecruiser Kabal on its mission to Earth, 1988)