Trechlians

The Trechlian race evolved on in unknown planet somewhere on the Perseus Arm of the Milky Way Galaxy, and achieved interstellar travel at approximately 840,000 B.C.. they quickly destroyed all species they came in contact with for reasons unknown before finally encountering the Keldarians. Immediately attacking they completely underestimated the enemy, as they had never encountered another race with similar, or in this case, more advanced technology than they. Their beam weapons were terribly ineffective against the shields of the Keldarian warships, and lost more than half of their entire fleet and their only Kolossus Battleship they had ever created. They fled the system, tails tucked. Though they were not pursued, they were quite shaken that they could lose.The Trechlian fleet grew back to power, hunting down more species they encountered, but remaining ever wary of "The Adversaries".

The Trechlians developed a terrible schism of thought between the power of the mental network as a whole and the reliance on self-achievement and individual prowess. From a human standpoint both sides look evil, the networkists wanting the mass-accumulation of First-Lifers to throw at the enemy, while the primordial elders saw all others only as slaves or bodies for their ancient minds. It didn't take very long at all for a warlike species like the Trechlians to deal with a problem like this. The solution was the same that they had used all the times they had found with all of the other species. Only this time it was on themselves.

The Trechlian species annihilated itself in a planet-side neutronic holocaust on their homeworld and every colony in a brilliant show that lasted less than two hours. While the people planetside released the greatest destruction ever recorded, the ships orbiting the planets began blasting each other out of the sky.Eventually only one ship was left floating, and it was eventually forced down for repairs. They found the environment far too inhospitable, so the 20,000 crewmen entered stasis pods, with the commander awakening every 10,000 years to check the instruments to check for safety.

Humanity stumbled across this sleeper ship while investigating a planet which they saw ruins upon from telescopic pictures. On the only planet ever confirmed to house Trechlians, named Zomus-4 by the Humans, they found the first evidence of alien life. This event was known to them as the First Encounter. They opened one of the tubes inside of the ship, unknowingly waking everyone on board, and quickly fell to the creatures. The Trechlians found radio broadcasts coming from earth to the colony, and quickly gathered whatever warships they could find and made their way to the human homeworld. In the orbital bombardment of earth in the Sol Conflict of 2450 A.D., Humanity ceased to be.

Trechlians are eight foot tall dark green humanoids that lack skin and are covered in thick layers of muscles. Trechlians are some of the most physically adept species in the galaxy, stronger than a gorilla with the reflexes of a mountain lion. Their head does not sit upon an upright neck like most species but rather juts forward from between the shoulders, lacking a mouth and other physical characteristics of a face. All that lies upon the hard featured face are six red eyes surrounding a larger central one and a muscle-like mass jutting out of the cheeks and chin and hanging under the chin.

Trechlians suffer a strange problem that comes from their eyes seeing shapes, not color. This means they cannot see through solid objects like glass unless they have the implants to overcome it. Trechlians are somewhat telepathic as they communicate with other species through a limited form of telepathy. Their mental voices have been described as cunning, vicious, grainy, and dark, though each voice is different. They they communicate constantly with all nearby Trechlians through a mass of consciousness that they call the Network. This Network becomes extremely useful when multiple Trechlians enter combat,as they can see through any other member's eyes, helping to get the perfect precision and increasing accuracy by exponential amounts.

In addition, having thousands of minds at easy disposal is quite beneficial. Essentially every Trechlian has a search engine in his head. He can call up the most personal of memories or the most hidden of knowledge that any member has ever briefly encountered like he was there. A member can stop from being probed by cutting himself off from the Network, losing all of its benefits. Trechlians rarely can endure this for long, as they feel trapped and alone. all of their life they have had constant noise, community, and society running through their head. The utter silence is, disturbing, to say the least. Other species simply can't fill the void of their family/society

Now don't get the idea that Trechlians live in a huge society of friends and caring family. Trechlian society is dominated by leaders who have gone through hundreds of lives. First-lifers are simply bodies for the minds of the elders, or they are used to fire the ship weapons. They are totally expendable as Trechlians can have as many as 20 children a month. The Supreme Commander of the Trechlian Consortium, the leader of all of the Trechlian fleets together, has gone through 726 lives. The High Consul, the man who led the assault on Sol-3 has gone through 539 lives.

Trechlians live a brutally short life of about 17 years, pitifully short compared to other races. They have found the key to escaping death however. At 15 years old, the member voluntarily and mentally kills himself. His mind then reenters the mass of conciousness where it is reaccepted. This mind then enters the mind of a first-lifer infant, wiping the childs mind and potential, allowing the elder to take over. It could be possible for a mind to be rejected, but that would require at least a majority. This is unlikely to be used on anyone since Trechlians are almost always universal in mind. Whatever conflicts happened in the short-lived Trechlian Civil war, the mental assaults were likely as devestating as the bombs themselves.

If any member dies out of range of the Network, the body is retrieved under any means neccesary. The mind can still be retrieved after death. Through touch, the lost brother can be brought back into the fold. No such rescue is given for a first lifer.

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Trechlians have valuable, useful, and unique implants. Unlike most species, Trechlians are not totally set in their shapes. They lack any form of skin, so the muscles are quite visible on the exterior and can be unraveled easily. The muscles are thick and leathery, so they naturally evolved without bones. In between the muscles where bones would be are something akin to arteries in humans. These too are thick and leathery, so they can easily be pushed aside to house implants with no surgery required. Though Trechlians can only unravel themselves so much, they have been witnessed to spread their chest muscles apart and pull in a creatures' head, suffocating it. This is likely a terribly painful way to die.

The implants are another reason bodies are recovered, as most Trechlians that aren't on their first life carry several of these. While it would be nice to think that Trechlians retrieve bodies only to get implants and bring their trapped minds back into society, there is one other reason Trechlians retrieve bodies, a reason that disturbs most other species. Since every Trechlian planet was bombed by extremely powerful neutron bombs, no life of even bacterial scale survived. The ship that survived was totally sterile as well, meaning nothing but the Trechlians survived. Nothing of similar protein structure exists in the galaxy. Thus the only thing Trechlians can eat, are Trechlians.

Although it seems like this wouldn't work since some energy is always lost as heat. This is not the case however, as Trechlians can extract humungous amounts of energy from breaking down silicon bonds, as this system is more than 80 times more effective than respiration in humans. Scientists hypothesize that this developed when the species moved from a homeworld that had an extremely silicon-rich atmosphere to a colonies with a small amount of silicon, like the average planet. Since no species is similar to the Trechlians in structure, they never decompose. They could lay literally forever before being discovered.

It is unknown and unlikely that Trechlians have genders, although all of them have masculine personalities. They were originally thought to be bred to queens, but this was proven totally false during the battle for Alta-7.It is still unknown if they are sexual or asexual.

Though the Trechlians are no where near as powerful in the air as on the ground, their powerful Beam weapons find no resistance in enemy armor. Fortunately, the Trechlians have no shields, although many Keldarians claim that their Kolossus Battleship had primitive shielding, only that it was a very yellow color, similar to their beams. This may be because the shield was powered by the same silicon blood as the rest of their technology. The Flagship also bears shields, but the normal kind, probably taken off of the Unknown Cruiser at the battle of Sol. This lack of shields has been solved by Trechlian metallurgists, who have found a way to increase the armor on every Trechlian ship while still keeping it light. The Trechlians managed to build ships at an exponential rate that stunned even the Keldarians. Many hope that this process has been lost to the Trechlians, for if not, the entire galaxy is in for a wake-up call.

Balach Starfighter

The basic starfighter of the Trechlian fleet, the Balach is ancient in design and likely the most numerous ship ever made; over 112 BILLION made an appearance at the Trechlian Occurrence. They carry two sets of beam weapons, one inside of the wing and one underneath. These guns are fueled by a dozen liquified Trechlians. In case of emergency, these can be consumed by the pilot. The guns can fire a staggering 3600 times before running out. Many pilots who can't face defeat choose to hook themselves up to the guns, firing an additional hundred shots before the drain kills them.

Charin Assault Fighter

This ship is unique in that it is a starfighter mounting a capital ship weapon. It too carries liquified Trechlians, only these are used much faster. The Charin mounts a heavy beam weapon, and it holds three shots worth of bodies. The pilot fires the first at medium range on his approach towards a capital ship. The second shot is fired at short range a moment later as the ship screams toward the vessel. The third and final shot is joined by a symphony of proton torpedoes at point blank range, drawing its power from, and in the process, killing the pilot. A moment later the ship tears through the already damaged hull in an amazing impact as the engine stackpoles, or blows up under pressure. These one-use kamikazes deal insane damage when a wing of ten or so is placed against a single target.

Trechlian Warship

Where the Balach is the most common starfighter in existence, the Warship is likely the most common capital ship, as 224 million of these carried those fighters into the Trechlian Occurrence. Five hundred meters long with a narrow body and long fins, it has been described as shark-like, both in shape and attitude. It can bring up to 25 Heavy Beams to point, making it a rival to some Gargantuan ships. With a crew of 450, the other 19,550 Trechlians on board give orders, prep to land, and go about their normal lives, whatever that may be. Warships always carry around 500 fighters, most of them Balachs. There have been accounts of ships that only specialize in carrying Charin Fighters while other accounts state that each Warship carries around 20 Charins. Whatever the case, these ships are numerous, powerful, and serve as the base ship of the Trechlian fleet.

Kolossus Battlecruiser (Battleship)

Though relatively small compared to the largest ships out there, the Kolossus is deadly in its underestimation. It has even more titanic armor than the average Trechlian ship, keeping it from doing any kind of maneuver. In addition it carries 24 Titan Beam Cannons in sets of 8, equivalent to Heavy Turbolasers. It also carries up to 1000 fighters, plus 60 Heavy Beam Cannons, all adding on to this behemoth. It is very different in shape from the Warship, As it is very bulky and has what was described as a large mouth. It carries similar fins to that of the Warship, only larger and covered with more guns. The only Kolossus ever recorded to exist was destroyed during the Occurrence, but many scholars of Trechlian society believe that it's only a matter of time before they build another.