General: Souls are the alien species that take over the minds and bodies of other species, including humans.
They have taken over most of Earth leaving only a few bands of "insurgents" or still "'wild' humans", which they describe as "soulless". They are described as being by nature "all things good: compassionate, patient, honest, virtuous, and full of love."
History: The Vultures were the first extraterrestrials the Souls came into contact with. They discovered The Origin, conquered it like they did with other planets, and made life difficult for the souls. However, the Souls found out they could use the Vultures as hosts. They assimilated the Vultures, as well as the inhabitants of the other planets the Vultures conquered.
Soon the Souls themselves started spreading and taking over new planets they discovered by replacing their sentient inhabitants. This process was made efficient by Spider technology once the Spiders were assimilated.
Physical: Souls by themselves are described as shining, like a living ribbon, with around one thousand feathery attachments. Wanderer has 1008 of these attachments. It is unknown if this number differs between Souls. Their chemical make-up is very different from humans and human poisons don't affect them.
When outside of a host body a Soul is mostly helpless and will succumb if not placed in hybernation inside a cryotank. It is known that outside of the exception of the cryotank, Souls will succumb very quickly to too cold or too hot environments, as seen when Wanderer kept another Soul from freezing to death by keeping it in her Bear host's pouch. The Origin is the only place where Souls can exist for long periods of time outside of a cryotank or a host.
In between hosts, souls hibernate in cryogenic tanks in a state of deep suspended animation. When an appropriate host is found by The Seekers, the souls are surgically inserted by their own medical specialists through an incision at the top of the host's spinal column.
In terms of reproduction: One in about five thousand of mostly sexless, sterile Souls have the ability to reproduce. The Soul makes a conscious decision to reproduce, which sets a process in it's body in motion. The body apparently rips itself apart while each cell turn into an infant Soul. About a million Souls are produced in this way, while the "Mother" perishes. The infant Soul has a portion of their mother's memories (who in turn has some of her mother's memories). In this way Souls remember certain events that happened to an ancestor. Sometimes when souls inhuman hosts have sexual interaction it can fertilize a human egg, but the babies brain starts to develop a soul occurs due to the humans are hosting souls, only creates one or two due to the amount of offspring that are created, the case is with the babies being born with souls already inside is that there would never be a human conscious meaning when the soul is extracted there is a short time frame in which they can extract and implant another if not the host will die.
Souls do not age (while their host bodies may) and can apparently live indefinitely as long as a host or cryotank is available.
Souls have their host bodies eat whatever the body considers as food. The Soul itself doesn't feed but may perhaps gain nutrients from the host body.
Meaning: Hosts are humans (or other individual organisms) who have had their body and mind taken over by a Soul.
Skippers are Souls who do not complete their hosts life-term before moving on to a new host, possibly on a new planet. Doing this without a valid reason (such as the mental health of the Soul) is viewed as wasteful and goes against general Soul philosophy.
A Calling is equivalent, but more intensely viewed, to a job which the Soul feels an affinity towards
Culture: Each soul has a Calling, which is akin to a vocation. The Souls apparently view their Calling in a dutiful light and/or fair exchange for the goods each Soul can take without direct compensation to the provider (as Soul economy is devoid of the concept of money). Examples of Callings include Healers (medical professionals), Comforters (psychological therapists), Seekers (who hunt the remaining indigenous sentient inhabitants of a world) and other Callings which are merely human jobs in post-Soul invasion form.
They tend not to keep the name of their host after insertion, but revert to their own names (which are usually translations of names they had on previous worlds). Darren is a notable exception. They may also take a new name matching their current world and may even create one from a concept matching the Soul (such as "Wanderer").
Due to their nature Soul society, though thriving on the debateably unjust destruction of other sentient species, is a very peaceful and ideal one based on equal love and understanding.
The Souls do apparently however have a controversial ideology against other sentient species as they are willing to dispose of them and take their place to make their world a "better place" with disregard for the sentience of their hosts (debatebly they wouldn't treat another of their own kind in this way).
They tend to preserve most of the positive and neutral elements of the society they replace (experience is an important Soul idea), while refraining from the negative (evil; harmful) components as far as possible. They do however replace the aeronautics and health care components with more efficient versions.
Calling: A Calling is a host word for a job. The souls do not get paid in their job since no soul has to pay for anything on the planet Earth. Every soul in a host has a Calling. Wanderer's Calling is Teaching the souls' History. Since Wanderer has now lived on nine worlds, she knows mostly everything about all of the History. Many souls are intrigued with Wanda's stories, and she loves to tell them. During the raids Wanderer had been on, many Callings are what the human hosts used to do when they had control.
Although Wanderer wasn't interested in Healing, she knows a great deal of healing wounds.
A lists of Callings on Earth are:
Musical Performers Professor Storyteller Seeker Comforter Healer Artist Mother
These are some of the Callings although there are many others.
Insertion: Insertion is the procedure by which a soul is implanted into the body of a new host. It is considered to be a very simple procedure which "any soul on the street could perform in an emergency". Typically, insertions result in a loss of the host's sentience, with an anomaly being humans with knowledge of what is coming. As a rule, insertions are only performed by Healers, the soul equivalent of a medical professional. But still it is unknown where the actual insertion is medical equipment came from.
Habitat: The Souls originally inhabited The Origin (the only planet which allows the Souls to be exposed to external environments for a longer period of time), before extending their "empire" to many other habitable planets by taking the local sentient species' bodies.
Souls~
General:
Souls are the alien species that take over the minds and bodies of other species, including humans.
They have taken over most of Earth leaving only a few bands of "insurgents" or still "'wild' humans", which they describe as "soulless". They are described as being by nature "all things good: compassionate, patient, honest, virtuous, and full of love."
History:
The Vultures were the first extraterrestrials the Souls came into contact with. They discovered The Origin, conquered it like they did with other planets, and made life difficult for the souls. However, the Souls found out they could use the Vultures as hosts. They assimilated the Vultures, as well as the inhabitants of the other planets the Vultures conquered.
Soon the Souls themselves started spreading and taking over new planets they discovered by replacing their sentient inhabitants. This process was made efficient by Spider technology once the Spiders were assimilated.
Physical:
Souls by themselves are described as shining, like a living ribbon, with around one thousand feathery attachments. Wanderer has 1008 of these attachments. It is unknown if this number differs between Souls. Their chemical make-up is very different from humans and human poisons don't affect them.
When outside of a host body a Soul is mostly helpless and will succumb if not placed in hybernation inside a cryotank. It is known that outside of the exception of the cryotank, Souls will succumb very quickly to too cold or too hot environments, as seen when Wanderer kept another Soul from freezing to death by keeping it in her Bear host's pouch. The Origin is the only place where Souls can exist for long periods of time outside of a cryotank or a host.
In between hosts, souls hibernate in cryogenic tanks in a state of deep suspended animation. When an appropriate host is found by The Seekers, the souls are surgically inserted by their own medical specialists through an incision at the top of the host's spinal column.
In terms of reproduction:
One in about five thousand of mostly sexless, sterile Souls have the ability to reproduce. The Soul makes a conscious decision to reproduce, which sets a process in it's body in motion. The body apparently rips itself apart while each cell turn into an infant Soul. About a million Souls are produced in this way, while the "Mother" perishes. The infant Soul has a portion of their mother's memories (who in turn has some of her mother's memories). In this way Souls remember certain events that happened to an ancestor. Sometimes when souls inhuman hosts have sexual interaction it can fertilize a human egg, but the babies brain starts to develop a soul occurs due to the humans are hosting souls, only creates one or two due to the amount of offspring that are created, the case is with the babies being born with souls already inside is that there would never be a human conscious meaning when the soul is extracted there is a short time frame in which they can extract and implant another if not the host will die.
Souls do not age (while their host bodies may) and can apparently live indefinitely as long as a host or cryotank is available.
Souls have their host bodies eat whatever the body considers as food. The Soul itself doesn't feed but may perhaps gain nutrients from the host body.
Meaning:
Hosts are humans (or other individual organisms) who have had their body and mind taken over by a Soul.
Skippers are Souls who do not complete their hosts life-term before moving on to a new host, possibly on a new planet. Doing this without a valid reason (such as the mental health of the Soul) is viewed as wasteful and goes against general Soul philosophy.
A Calling is equivalent, but more intensely viewed, to a job which the Soul feels an affinity towards
Culture:
Each soul has a Calling, which is akin to a vocation. The Souls apparently view their Calling in a dutiful light and/or fair exchange for the goods each Soul can take without direct compensation to the provider (as Soul economy is devoid of the concept of money). Examples of Callings include Healers (medical professionals), Comforters (psychological therapists), Seekers (who hunt the remaining indigenous sentient inhabitants of a world) and other Callings which are merely human jobs in post-Soul invasion form.
They tend not to keep the name of their host after insertion, but revert to their own names (which are usually translations of names they had on previous worlds). Darren is a notable exception. They may also take a new name matching their current world and may even create one from a concept matching the Soul (such as "Wanderer").
Due to their nature Soul society, though thriving on the debateably unjust destruction of other sentient species, is a very peaceful and ideal one based on equal love and understanding.
The Souls do apparently however have a controversial ideology against other sentient species as they are willing to dispose of them and take their place to make their world a "better place" with disregard for the sentience of their hosts (debatebly they wouldn't treat another of their own kind in this way).
They tend to preserve most of the positive and neutral elements of the society they replace (experience is an important Soul idea), while refraining from the negative (evil; harmful) components as far as possible. They do however replace the aeronautics and health care components with more efficient versions.
Calling:
A Calling is a host word for a job. The souls do not get paid in their job since no soul has to pay for anything on the planet Earth. Every soul in a host has a Calling. Wanderer's Calling is Teaching the souls' History. Since Wanderer has now lived on nine worlds, she knows mostly everything about all of the History. Many souls are intrigued with Wanda's stories, and she loves to tell them. During the raids Wanderer had been on, many Callings are what the human hosts used to do when they had control.
Although Wanderer wasn't interested in Healing, she knows a great deal of healing wounds.
A lists of Callings on Earth are:
Musical Performers
Professor
Storyteller
Seeker
Comforter
Healer
Artist Mother
These are some of the Callings although there are many others.
Insertion:
Insertion is the procedure by which a soul is implanted into the body of a new host. It is considered to be a very simple procedure which "any soul on the street could perform in an emergency". Typically, insertions result in a loss of the host's sentience, with an anomaly being humans with knowledge of what is coming. As a rule, insertions are only performed by Healers, the soul equivalent of a medical professional. But still it is unknown where the actual insertion is medical equipment came from.
Habitat:
The Souls originally inhabited The Origin (the only planet which allows the Souls to be exposed to external environments for a longer period of time), before extending their "empire" to many other habitable planets by taking the local sentient species' bodies.